Children of the Stars
by agent000
Summary: Edward is an alien. Worse than that, he glows, constantly. Worse than that, he's on Earth as a foreign exchange student, and he can't turn his glow off, so it's hard to stay hidden. And here this started out as a normal day.
1. Chapter 1

_**Hello, everyone! I'm still alive and kicking and am finally managing to write again after a severe bout of writer's block. Those of you who want to remind me to update my other stories, rest assured, I haven't forgotten them and will do them when I do them. I'm not making any promises as to when, since pushing myself was what started the writer's block in the first place, and I don't want to go through all that nonsense again, heh.**_

_**Anyway, the rest of you have either clicked on this story because it sounded interesting, received a notification in your inbox, or have simply been waiting on this story because you knew it was coming. Welcome to all of you, and I hope that you all enjoy this fic. It might be a little rough at first because I'm still pulling myself out of writer's block, but hopefully each chapter will be successively smoother. **_

_**Much thanks goes to AdventureAddict, AuricVision, Azure-Spiral, and Azure-Spiral's brother who doesn't have an FFN account, hehe. All of them have helped me tremendously with this fic, and I doubt it would have gotten off the ground if it weren't for them. Many of the ideas implemented into this story have come from them. Also much thanks to my beta Weirdly for finding ways to make sense of my awkward phrasing and pointing out that I really should stop saying words like "individual" and "obviously" so much, hehe. Also the fact that she points out plotholes is a major help.**_

_**And now, I know you're all screaming, "Get on with it!" so okay, okay, I'll move along. Hope you all enjoy!**_

_**Disclaimer: Hmm, I can come up with a creative fic, but not a creative disclaimer? What's the matter with me? Maybe I need to get all the people mentioned in the previous paragraph together just to think of one.**_

_**Muse: What about me?**_

_**Me: No, you suck at disclaimers.**_

_**Muse: ((crosses arms)) Do you want me to help you write your story or not?**_

_**Me: ((shrugs)) If the disclaimer means that much to you, then say it.**_

_**Muse: She doesn't own Fullmetal Alchemist. So THERE! ((sticks tongue out))**_

_**Me: ((rolls eyes)) Okay...you're weird. Now let's get on with this, shall we?**_

_**Muse: Fine...**_

* * *

Al and Winry fidgeted on the train platform as they waited for the 5:10 train. Winry was shifting her weight from one foot to the other, complaining periodically about how uncomfortable her shoes were or how they should have built the platform better or that the station should have more benches to sit on, but Al said nothing. He knew exactly how she was really feeling, as he was feeling it too. After wringing his hands and then wiping his sweaty palms on his pants for the tenth time in the past five minutes, he checked the time on his watch. 5:05. Was his watch running slower than normal? He could have sworn that it had read 5:04 ten minutes prior.

Winry finally sighed and lowered her head, causing Al to look away from his watch to find out what was the matter. "Al," she said, "I hope we didn't do something stupid."

Al raised an eyebrow. "In what way?"

Looking up to meet his gaze, Winry said, "In not specifying anything about the exchange student we're hosting. What if he's a creep?"

"What if he's not a he?" asked Al.

"Exactly!" Winry threw her arms up in the air in an obviously exasperated gesture. "We don't even know whether the person is male or female. What made us think this was a good idea?"

Al placed a reassuring hand on the frustrated girl's shoulder, causing her to lower her arms back to her sides and sigh. He really couldn't blame her for her reaction, as he'd been having doubts the past few weeks as well. But it was a little late to change one's mind now, with the subject of their discussion only a few minutes away. Like it or not, Mystery Person would need a place to stay, and they _had_ agreed to provide that place.

They couldn't go back, though unfortunately the thought that their family home would contain another member was enough to make anyone a bit queasy, especially since they didn't actually know who was coming to fill that role. They might as well just make the best of what they had gotten themselves into.

The train whistle jolted Al out of his reverie; both he and Winry looked up to see the train pulling into the station. Al unconsciously stepped forward in anticipation, though the train had not yet stopped. He breathed out a sigh of relief even as his pulse accelerated. That was an unusual feeling, being relieved and terrified at the same time. He wasn't sure if he had ever experienced that before, but then, he'd never had a foreign exchange student, a stranger, move into his home before either.

At last the train came to a halt and Winry and Al watched people board and get off the train, trying to detect anyone that might possibly be from a foreign country. As this was Reisenburgh, a foreigner would likely stand out among the country homogeneity. It would have been so much easier if they had even just the country they were to come from, as that would help them know what ethnic characteristics to look for.

Somehow they had thought that being surprised would be a good idea at the time, since they couldn't make up their minds, but now that Al could see how much anxiety it caused, he wondered if it had been worth it. What if they couldn't even find him or her? Would the person end up sleeping here all night at the station in a country they knew nothing about? Would the poor person get sent back to wherever they had come from? Al felt a lump form in his stomach at such thoughts, and became all the more determined to find whoever it was so that they would at least not feel abandoned.

Al closed his eyes and took a slow deep breath to calm himself down, but was rudely brought out of his trance by Winry repeatedly poking at his shoulder and shouting, "Look, look, there he is!" He opened his eyes and followed her pointing finger to a cloaked individual standing a little way off. With the cloak drawn up over his head, the stranger's facial features were unrecognizable, and one couldn't tell whether he was foreign or not. Al wondered briefly how Winry had known that this was their exchange student when he finally noticed the suitcase that the boy was carrying: a piece of paper had been attached to it that read "Alphonse Elric and Winry Rockbell". This person was smart to have figured out how to get noticed when neither side knew what to look for in the other.

Al took another deep breath for courage and then sauntered up to the young man, Winry trailing closely behind. Having apparently heard the sound of their approaching footsteps, the stranger placed his suitcase down by his feet and stepped forward to greet the two Amestrians.

"Alphonse Elric and Winry Rockbell?"

Al smiled briefly and then nodded. He had expected whoever came to have an accent, since they were coming from a foreign country, but this accent was very mild. This person must have been studying the Amestrian language for a long time in order to attain such a level of proficiency.

"Yes, we're Al and Winry," Al said as he thrust out his hand to initiate a handshake. "And I presume that you're our exchange student?"

"Yes," said the person who, even though his face was hidden underneath the hood of his cloak, still seemed a bit confused as his head tilted between Al's hand and his his face. "What am I supposed to do with that?"

Al was nonplussed for a moment before suddenly realizing that the young man must have been referring to his outstretched hand. He tried to keep his amusement to himself, but he couldn't help it as a few chuckles managed to escape from his lips, causing Winry to jab him in the ribs with her elbow. This person may have studied the Amestrian language extensively before coming to this country, but he had obviously not taken the time to study their culture very much.

"It's an invitation for a handshake," Al said through a broad smile which he was trying to keep from turning into a fit of giggles, "I reach my hand out to you, and then you reach your hand out to me and clasp mine, and then we pump our arms up and down a few times."

"Like this?" said the stranger, reaching out and taking Al's hand and following the procedure Al had described. After being given confirmation that that was indeed the correct method, the stranger withdrew his hand and said, "So what do we do that for?"

Al had to bite his tongue to keep from laughing this time, as he didn't want the poor guy to feel bad for not knowing anything about their culture, but it was hilarious to him to see just how ignorant one could be about everyday things when in a foreign country. After regaining himself, he turned back to the stranger and said, "That's the way we greet each other. It's how we show friendliness."

"Oh!" said the individual, his hand coming up to his head as though contemplating this new notion. "I'll keep that in mind. That's different than what I'm used to. "

Winry finally found her voice and ventured to ask, "So, how do your people greet each other?"

Al could have sworn that the boy had chuckled slightly at her question, but he couldn't see the expressions on the person's face, so all he could do was guess. The boy then said, "Like this," and bent at the waist, going down into a low bow, to which Winry chuckled and returned the gesture.

When they both stood back up, Winry turned to the boy and asked, "So, what's your name?"

The boy bent down and picked up his suitcase and then turned back to face the girl. "You can call me Edward."

"That isn't your real name then?"

"More like a transliteration," he said, "You wouldn't be able to pronounce my real name."

Winry nodded in understanding. "Okay, that makes sense. Now why don't you take off your cloak so that we can see who we're talking to?"

At this, Edward twitched and reached his hand up to grip at his cloak, pulling it tighter so that it caused the opening in the hood to close slightly more than it had been. It didn't affect Al's and Winry's line of sight any, since they hadn't been able to see the guy's face in the first place, but the fact that he was so shy about his appearance was slightly disturbing.

"Are you okay?" asked Winry, obviously noticing the emotion behind the gesture. What was this guy afraid of?

"I wear this for traveling," said Edward, seemingly disregarding Winry's question entirely.

"I understand that," she said, "but you've reached your destination. You can take it off now."

The boy shrugged his cloak even tighter around his frame and silently shook his head. There was something seriously wrong in Al's opinion if someone wasn't even willing to take off their cloak, but what? Was it something simple and innocent like shyness, or was there more to it? The not knowing made him feel very uneasy.

"Come on," Winry persisted, as her nervousness tended to show with more force and hostility than Al's did, "No one's going to look at you funny for being foreign. Now take your cloak off!"

Edward took a step back at her harsh tone and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Now he was nervous too, it was obvious to anyone watching. Maybe Winry shouldn't have been so sharp, but then, it was a bit odd that the boy didn't want to remove his cloak in the first place. If he didn't want to do it, he should have at least been so kind as to tell them why. Surely he could see how much it worried them to not know what was going through his head. He shifted his grip on his cloak slightly and then looked up at Al and Winry.

"I—I'm not supposed to be—-" Edward started to say, but his voice had taken on a rather wobbly tone and he choked on his own words. "It's not safe for me to be—exposed."

It wasn't safe for him to be exposed? That could have meant so many different things, and the thought made Al twitch. Was it because he was on the run from the government? Or was it something as simple as being allergic to the sunlight? How he wished that the guy would just open up his mouth and tell them. Mysteries like this became amplified and scary when the person involved was unknown and abouut to live with you.

Winry let out a sigh of exasperation and threw her arms back. "You're honestly not planning on wearing that cloak the whole time you're here, are you?" Al placed his hand on her arm in a warning gesture, hoping that she'd catch on and not tick the guy off, but she just shrugged it off.

By the way Edward jerked his head toward her, he had made it obvious that he had thrown a glare. "Of course I'm not going to wear it the whole time!"

Winry placed her hands on her hips and glared right back. "Then why don't you just take it off? Did it ever occur to you that you might be creeping us out?"

Edward crossed his arms and turned away. Al stood nervously in place, looking between the two. "Maybe that was my intention." At this, Al smacked his forehead and let out a soft growl. What a way to start off a new relationship, by arguing and fighting about something so trivial. Maybe the guy really did have a legitimate reason to keep on his cloak while out in public, as unnerving as that thought was. He didn't like not knowing what the guy was hiding, but they couldn't just continue to stand here bickering.

"Look, let's just call a truce for now and pick this up again when we get home, okay?" Al said, looking up at the two who were now staring at him, apparently caught off guard by his exasperated smack. "We're making a scene. Let's just go and settle this at home."

Winry sighed and her shoulders relaxed. She cast one more glare at Edward, and then turned away with a look of determination. "Al's right, let's settle this at home. Come on, Edward." She then moved forward without another word and gestured for the other two to follow her. Edward and Al turned to look at each other, shrugged, and did as she asked.

The trio soon found the horse and cart that Al had thought to borrow from their neighbor earlier that day. They had known that their guest would be extremely tired after all that traveling, and they certainly didn't want to make him walk all the way back to their house. Mr. Jones had understood and graciously allowed them to use the cart for the day.

Edward stepped up to the cart and stared at it with what could only be perceived as an expression of bewilderment. Al cocked an eyebrow at this, but said nothing, instead climbing onto the cart and gesturing for Edward to do the same. The boy didn't take the suggestion immediately, however, as he began circling around the cart as though he'd never seen one before. It seemed strange to think that there could possibly be any location in the world that would be unfamiliar with horse drawn carts, but one never knew what was outside their country unless they actually left their country. Maybe Edward's country was so poor that they walked everywhere they went.

"So what does this thing do?" said Edward all of a sudden, gesturing towards the cart. Al had to snicker at that. Imagine someone not even knowing what a cart did! He was going to have a lot of interesting experiences with this guy, for sure.

"It gets you from place to place," said Al, holding his laughter back once again. The cloak may have been creepy to him, but the cultural illiteracy was hilarious.

Edward rubbed the side of his head and continued looking around the cart. "It seems like it wouldn't run very fast though. Oh wait, I know! It's got a jet pack hidden in the back, doesn't it?"

At this, Winry whipped around to face the boy. "A whattack?"

"A jet pack," said the boy again, "You know, the thing that forces air through it at such a high speed that it propels things forward?"

Winry snorted and turned back to her seat. "You've been reading too much science fiction."

"Science fiction? It's true!"

"Just get in, will you?"

Edward finally resigned himself to obeying and he climbed into the cart, seating himself in a position where he could see everything that went on. At least, that's what Al suspected he was doing. Considering all the strange questions, he probably wanted to see as much of Reisenburgh as he could.

Al sighed and turned back towards the front of the cart. He picked up the reigns, gave them a good snap, and the cart started to roll, throwing everyone but Al backwards at the sudden unexpected momentum.

"Whoa!" Edward said upon sitting up and shaking his head. This of course caused the horse to stop moving, so Al had to shake the reigns to get it to start again. It didn't jostle the others as much the second time since it was a bit more expected, though Edward seemed to be extremely tense...either that or extremely excited. Al couldn't tell which was the case.

"So," said Edward, "You pick up that steering device and it sends signals to that robot up ahead as to what to do?"

Winry turned and gave the boy yet another glare. "That's a horse, you idiot!"

"Oh," said Edward, rubbing the side of his head sheepishly. "That blank stare was confusing me." Al bit his tongue to keep from laughing once again, while Winry sighed and sat back into her seat and refused to say another word for the rest of the trip.

* * *

It wasn't long before the trio was standing at the front door of the house, Winry's hand raised to unlock the door, but Edward interrupted her. "What's this thing?" he said, pointing to the structure in front of him.

"You mean the door?" said Winry with a raised eyebrow.

"'Door'? Oh, so that's what it's called," he said without the slightest hint of embarrassment in his voice. His face then turned to look down at his feet. He pointed again and said, "What's this?"

"That's...a doormat..." Winry's patience was obviously draining out of her, judging by the tone in her voice, but either Edward didn't notice or he just didn't care. It was baffling.

"'Doormat'? Sounds similar to this 'door' thing." He looked back up and pointed to the door once again. "So what does a 'doormat' do?"

Winry sighed and shook her head. The poor girl obviously wouldn't last much longer under this kind of stupidity. She spoke through her gritted teeth. "It cleans your feet."

"Oh!" said Edward with a happy tone, and promptly stretched out his foot and just held it there, hovering above the mat. After a moment of saying nothing and much puzzlement going on between Al and Winry, Edward finally spoke up again. "Is this thing broken?"

Winry rolled her eyes, and Al decided it was time to intervene in order to salvage whatever was left of Winry's sanity. "Um, no, you do it yourself."

"What?" Edward put down his foot and whirled around to face Al, even though Al still couldn't see the face under the hood. He wondered how long this guy was going to persist in wearing it. "I have to clean my own feet? That's stupid."

Al didn't respond to that comment, and Winry didn't either as she had finally gotten the door unlocked and hurried inside, undoubtedly to get away from the crazy freak on her doorstep. Al started to follow after her, but had to stop and grab Edward's arm to convince him to come inside, as he hadn't seemed to realize that that was what he was supposed to do.

Once inside, Al turned to face Edward, and said, "You stay here for a few minutes, okay? Me and Winry have some things to discuss, so don't go anywhere."

"Okay," said Edward, who shrugged and then turned to pace around the living room.

Al sighed and walked into the kitchen where a very irritable Winry was waiting for him. The girl had placed her hands on her hips and was tapping her foot repeatedly, a warning sign for anyone who might annoy her to stay at least fifty feet away until the moment passed. Al took a deep breath, and then spoke up.

"So...he's not really what we expected, is he?"

Winry slapped her forehead in obvious exasperation and spun on her heels to face away from Al. "Not what we expected? Talk about the understatement of the year, Alphonse Elric!"

Al nervously rubbed at the back of his neck. His very nature wanted to stand up for the underdog, though he wasn't actually sure if Edward was really an underdog. Still, nature usually wins out. "Well, maybe he's just a huge fan of satirical humor."

"Do you honestly think I wouldn't recognize satire when I heard it?" Winry spun back around to face the boy, her eyes taking on a glare that would make Death himself scream with fright. "Alphonse, this guy believes the stuff he's saying. You can tell it in his voice and on his face."

"Well," said Al, still searching his mind for any excuse at all to protect the person who was the subject of their discussion, "You know, any exchange student will have a bit of a culture gap."

Winry snorted. "Culture gap? _Culture gap?_ You think this is a culture gap, Alphonse Elric? The guy doesn't even understand basic human concepts!"

"That is precisely what I have come here to understand, you know."

Al's and Winry's heads both snapped up at the sound of the unexpected voice, but didn't see the source. There were footsteps just outside of the kitchen, so Al concluded that Edward had heard their argument, as it had grown quite loud in volume over the course of the last few minutes, and had decided to break his agreement to stay in the living room, not that Al could blame him.

The first thing Al could see once the footsteps got closer was the vision of sunlight flooding the room. Had Edward somehow managed to open a door on his way to the kitchen? That didn't make sense once he thought about it, as there were no doors on that route that would shine in the kitchen like that, nor was it the right time of day.

Finally the footsteps ceased as Edward came to a halt just inside the kitchen. Al and Winry gasped simultaneously, and unconsciously took a step back. The sunlight was not coming from outside, but from the figure itself, as little sense as that made to them. Rays of light were emanating off of him and dissipating in his wake, almost as if they were made out of steam, though they clearly weren't. Al didn't have a better guess as to what they were though. Who was this? This couldn't be Edward. Their exchange student didn't glow like this.

Almost as though reading his thoughts, or rather his body language, the figure before them sighed and said, "Yes, I'm Edward. Now you know why I didn't want to remove my cloak outside."

They understood alright, and Al reached a startling conclusion which would explain all the oddities of the day, as bizarre as it sounded, but what was one more odd thing among so many? Edward wasn't human, which would explain his complete ignorance of human affairs, and he'd probably come from farther away than they had originally thought. Possibly even from another world.

_**Okay, hope you liked that. I've got chapter two written and waiting to get back from my beta, and I'm working on chapter three, so I'll be updating fairly soon. Feel free to offer suggestions and questions though if you'd like, as it helps me to know what I haven't addressed yet that confuses the readers, or just tells me what the readers would really like to see. It's up to you though. I don't need reviews to keep going, I'm just doing this for fun anyway, hehe.**_

_**If anyone is interested, I drew a couple pieces of fanart for this particular fic and have them uploaded on my deviantart account. Just go to reincarnated-al(dot)deviantart(dot)com and look in my gallery. The pics relating to this particular story are called "An Unusual Exchange Student" and "Dying World", and there may be more in the future if I get any further inspiration. I'm perfectly happy to upload your fanart of my fanfiction to my gallery as well. Just ask!**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**Finally, I get to upload the next chapter of this, hehe. Sorry it took me so long. My betas were having trouble with this one for whatever reason, so it took awhile, heh. I'll try to update this fic fortnightly from now on, but we'll see what happens.**_

_**And for some reason, I keep getting this question: "Why didn't Al and Winry react to hearing Edward's name?" Well, normally I try to answer questions in the narrative rather than in the Author's Notes, but this one has no place in the story at all, as it's purely the product of the readers not paying attention, hehe. This story is an AU, which stands for Alternate Universe. That means that the entire series of FMA never happened, and things are changed to whatever degree I want to change them. Therefore, Al and Winry just met Edward for the first time in the last chapter, and so didn't think anything strange about his name.**_

**_Anyway, I hope you enjoy!_**

_**Disclaimer: ((scratches head)) Somebody doesn't own Fullmetal Alchemist, but I've forgotten who. I'll have to get back to you on that.**_

All Al heard was blood pumping behind his ears, making him dizzy. How long could he survive in this state before he died? It felt like his cells weren't getting enough oxygen, though he knew he had forgotten to breathe. He felt himself staggering under his own weight, and decided to consciously breathe until his brain reverted to doing it automatically again.

He knew he had to say something. The...creature's...eyes were on him, waiting for him to react. He tried to speak, but his tongue refused to cooperate and all that came out was a grunt. Al shook his head and tried again, this time succeeding, though only slightly.

"W-Well...I-I guess we should...show you to your r-room?" He looked at Winry, pleading with his eyes, hoping she would understand. In case she thought he wanted to get out of trouble by putting her into it, he glanced at the telephone. If they could keep this...being...detained long enough without causing suspicion, they could call for help. They didn't know what a strange glowing entity might do to them.

Winry nodded, and turned to face Edward. The light radiating off him didn't hurt their eyes, since it wasn't _that_ bright, but it was still disturbing. "Okay, um, E-Edward? Shall I...show you to your...room?" She coughed and cleared her throat to keep Edward from saying anything, and she walked out of the kitchen, gesturing for Edward to follow.

Al crept out behind the two. He would make that call, but needed to make sure Edward was out of earshot. It would be bad to have the...thing...overhear him. He closed his eyes and chastised himself for being so inconsiderate in his thoughts. Whatever Edward was, he was a person, not a thing, and should be given respect.

Winry led Edward to the stairway, but Edward stopped a few feet away and stared in horror. "What's the matter?" Winry asked.

Edward extended a shaky finger toward the stairs. "What is that thing?"

Winry blinked. "You mean the stairs?"

"Stairs? What do 'stairs' do?"

"They get you from one floor to the other." Winry put out her foot to demonstrate. She had calmed down and wasn't as annoyed with Edward for not knowing things she was before. "Like this."

Edward screamed like a little girl. Eyebrows raised and wondered what his problem was. Edward calmed down finally and chuckled. "Oh, you're okay."

Winry rolled her eyes. "Silly, stairs won't hurt you."

"Oh. I didn't know." Edward shrugged and stepped onto the stairs. It held up, so he took another step. Then a third. He let out a laugh that sounded like an evil laugh of realization. A few minutes later, he was running up and down the stairs, chanting "Uuuuuuuuuup" and "Doooooooooowwwn."

Al and Winry exchanged glances. This was ridiculous. How hard was it to show someone to their room? Winry clenched her fists and stepped into Edward's path. She thrust out her arms just as the boy tried to pass her and caused him to double over at the waist. Al put his face in his hands. He wouldn't have tried that. Who knew whether Edward's glow was the result of high temperature like a star or a harmless phosphorescent glow? Winry seemed unharmed, so Al guessed it was the latter.

"Edward, that's enough!" Winry picked the boy back up and shook him by the shoulders as though reprimanding a child. "We're supposed to be heading to your room."

Edward rolled his eyes. "Fine...but your 'stairs' are fun!"

Winry started to make her way up the stairs with Edward again following close behind. She turned back and smiled over her shoulder. "If you think the stairs are amazing, just wait until you see my oven!"

"What's an 'oven'?" asked Edward, just as the two went out of Al's sight, though he could still hear them.

"It's a machine you cook in," Winry said, but Edward cut her off.

"Oh, that. Nothing special. I saw one in a museum."

Judging by Edward's screams coming from upstairs, Al knew the wrench queen had struck again. So much for not arousing suspicion.

Al walked to the telephone and picked up the receiver. He froze and realized he didn't know who to call. The police wouldn't believe him. The military might if he sounded sincere enough, but he wasn't sure he could trust the military.

He could call the exchange student agency and ask them what happened. They could send someone out to take Edward back to wherever he had come from, but that would take several days, and he wanted, no, he _needed_ immediate results.

He placed the phone back on the cradle, keeping the receiver tight in his grip as though letting go would sever his connection to the outside world. There didn't seem to be anyone to call, unless he was forgetting someone. If so, he hoped he would remember before Edward came downstairs.

The phone rang, and Al jumped and stared at his hand. Who would be calling at a time like this? He shook his head. Maybe whoever was calling knew something.

He lifted the receiver and pressed it to his ear. "H-Hello?"

"Hello, this is Reisenburgh Station. We have a call for Mr. Alphonse Elric."

Al gulped, but there was no saliva to swallow. All the tension of the past few minutes had dried his mouth. "Speaking."

There was static on the other end of the line as the phone switched from one person to the other. Al sighed and waited, his imagination kicking into overdrive. Maybe whoever was calling knew about Edward. Maybe they thought he and Winry were in on whatever Edward was part of. Maybe...

"Mr. Elric? This is Rose Thomas." Al's thoughts came to a halt as the gentle feminine voice came floating through the phone. "I thought you had planned to pick me up."

Al was confused. He hadn't met this girl, yet she seemed to know who he was. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. This was too much for one day. "I'm sorry, who are you?"

"I'm your exchange student."

Al went numb and the receiver became too heavy for him as it slipped through his fingers and clattered onto the table. Whatever calming effect the voice had on him earlier had been lost. _She _was their exchange student? But they had only asked for _one_! The agency didn't make a mistake, did it? No, surely they wouldn't have done that, as it would have put the students in danger. But if they hadn't made a mistake, then that could only mean that one of these people was their exchange student, and the other was a fraud. Al gulped. He suspected he knew who the fraud was.

He regained control of himself and picked up the receiver again. The girl on the other end of the line was calling his name repeatedly. He cleared his throat and said, "Rose, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to neglect you...but there appears to have been a mix up. Someone already came claiming to be our exchange student."

"What?!" Rose shouted, making Al wince and pull the phone away from his ear. "That's just...I'M your exchange student. I have the documents here to prove it!"

Documents? Edward had never shown them any documents, though they hadn't thought to ask him. Raised in a small town like Reisenburgh, they hadn't been taught to mistrust everyone. Al was becoming certain who the actual exchange student was and who the fraud was. Poor Rose, why did she have to get caught in this mess? Why was Edward pretending to be an exchange student? Was he an intergalactic spy whose race planned to invade the earth?

"Mr. Elric?"

Al shook his head to rid himself of the thoughts. He really needed to put a harness on his imagination. "Rose, I'm sorry about the mix up. I'll come get you, and then...we'll figure this out somehow. Okay?"

The girl agreed, and Alphonse ended the conversation as he replaced the receiver with a sigh. This was not supposed to be so complicated.

"Are you okay?"

Al whirled around to look into the face of Winry. He breathed a sigh of relief. At least she was unaccompanied, so that meant Edward had stayed upstairs.

"Winry..." he said and stopped. He moistened his lips and decided to speak anyway, even if his words came out sounding stupid. "I don't think Edward was supposed to be our exchange student."

"What do you mean?"

"I just got a call from a girl at the train station. Someone we were supposed to pick up. She has _documents_, Winry, does Edward have any documents?"

Winry shook her head as a finger stroked her chin. "I...don't think so..."

"Exactly."

"So what are we going to do, Al?"

"Well," he said, "The first thing to do is pick the girl up from the station, then maybe the four of us can solve this together. Do you think you can handle the glowing wonder on your own for a few minutes?"

Winry smiled and pulled a wrench out of her pocket and smacked it into the palm of her other hand. "I think I've installed a healthy fear in him."

Al chuckled and couldn't help but pity the glowing boy upstairs. He knew what that smirk on Winry's face meant, and it appeared that even strange glowing beings could not escape her wrath.

"O-kay...then. I'll see you soon." Al grabbed his coat and left.

* * *

Winry placed her hand on her forehead and staggered through the hallway to the kitchen. She needed to do something to keep her mind occupied while Al was gone. She had already filled all her auto-mail orders for the week, Al had just left, and Den was being cared for by a neighbor. All the things she usually did to pass the time had been ruled out, so she shrugged and looked at her new oven. Edward may not have thought it remarkable, but she knew just how much work she had put into building it. Maybe she could pass the time using it.

As she opened cupboards and placed various ingredients and utensils on the counter, she noticed the shadow her hand cast had taken on a sharp quality over a period of about two seconds. That could only mean one thing. She whirled around and saw Edward standing there, staring at her and remaining silent. At least his glow made it impossible for him to sneak up on people. Even if he approached her from behind, he would still make the shadows around her act weird.

"Edward!" she cried, "What are you...is something the matter?"

Edward shook his head. "No, I was just bored." He thrust his hands into his...pockets? Winry couldn't actually see where his skin ended and his clothes started, as it was all so bright.

"What are you doing?"

Winry blinked as her mind returned to the matter at hand. She had wanted to distract herself from Edward, yet here was the cause of her need to do so standing in front of her. Great. The Fates were probably laughing at her plight. "I was going to make chocolate chip cookies." She stopped and considered her next sentence. "Would you like to help?"

Edward shrugged and walked over to the counter. "What are choco—whats?"

Winry couldn't help herself, and she chuckled. Maybe some of Al's spirit had worn off on her. She'd met people who hadn't liked cookies before. She believed that there were people who had never tried cookies before. But someone who didn't know what cookies were? That was strange.

"You've never heard of chocolate chip cookies, Edward?"

The boy shook his head. "No...?"

Her smile brightened in spite of her efforts against it. "It's a sweet thing we make." Edward looked confused. All her resolve to not laugh vanished, and she giggled. "Seriously, Ed, you have to try one. You haven't lived until you've tasted a chocolate chip cookie."

"I guess I have no choice then," said Edward, a smirk on his face. He stopped and his face fell back into a neutral expression Winry couldn't read. "Did you just call me Ed?"

Winry eyes widened and she clapped a hand over her mouth. Had she just called him by his familiar name instead of his formal one? It probably wasn't important, but she didn't think it right to be getting comfortable around someone who had made her and Al feel so _un_comfortable. Granted, he didn't seem as threatening as he looked, but should she be letting her guard down?

"We sometimes shorten names to make them more personal." She opened a drawer and grabbed a mixing spoon.

"Oh," said Edward, who turned to look out the kitchen at the front door, "Is that like how you call Alphonse 'Al'?" Winry nodded. He smiled and said, "Does that mean that I can call you 'Win'?"

Winry dropped the spoon she was holding and it clattered on the counter. Nobody called her 'Win', not anymore. The last people to call her that were her parents, and they weren't around anymore. Even Al didn't call her that; he never had.

"Are you okay?"

Winry looked into Edward's eyes. The guy was supposed to be scary. He was supposed to be a threat to them that they had to get rid of. He wasn't supposed to be concerned. Her guard was beginning to drop, and she wasn't sure she liked that. This guy might be dangerous, and she was starting to act casual around him. Maybe she shouldn't have let Al leave her alone with him. Maybe she couldn't handle him by herself after all.

"I'm fine," she lied, and changed the subject. "Okay, I'll measure the ingredients, and you can stir them. How does that sound?"

"I guess..." said Edward, "But I don't know what I'm doing."

"It's okay. You only have to stir the ingredients until they're mixed into a sort of goo."

"It doesn't sound very appetizing."

Winry chuckled again. She was trying to resist, but he had cast a spell over her that made her feel comfortable with his childish curiosity. How could someone who asked so many innocent questions be dangerous, even if their skin had an unnatural glow? Maybe they could convince the other exchange student to go elsewhere and they could keep Edward...no, that wouldn't be fair. They had agreed to take in an exchange student, not a...freak, as sweet a freak as Edward was. That other person didn't deserve to come all the way from her home country to be turned away at the door. Edward would have to leave, it was for the best, but at least he'd remember what chocolate chip cookies were.

"Silly, you don't eat the dough. You bake it until it's hard."

"Wouldn't that hurt your teeth?"

She rolled her eyes. "Not _that_ hard."

A few minutes later, the ingredients had been assembled in the mixing bowl and she had showed Edward how to stir properly. That had been a hassle. Edward had been holding the mixing spoon by the bowl and stirring with the handle, thinking that it was logical that the big end was the end one was meant to grip. It took a couple minutes of explanation to convince him that the big end went into the bowl and the narrow end was the one you held.

Winry picked up a bag of chocolate chips and began pouring them into the mixture. Edward stopped stirring and stared. She noticed his reaction and looked up into his face. "Is something the matter?"

His eyes flickered between the bag of chocolate chips and the batter. "You put rocks in your sweets?"

Winry felt another chuckle coming on, but resisted it. The boy probably felt foolish enough for not understanding things, she shouldn't make it worse. "No, these are chocolate chips." She picked one up and popped it into her mouth. "Here," she held another piece of chocolate out to Edward. "Try one."

Edward stared at it as though not sure what to do with it, but Winry stood firm with her hand outstretched. He picked the single chocolate chip off her palm and said, "So I eat this?"

Winry laughed. "Yes, eat it."

Edward shrugged and popped the chocolate chip into his mouth. He took a moment to chew, then closed his eyes, groaned, and began to fall backward. Fortunately the boy caught himself before she had a chance to react, but that was not the reaction she'd expected. Had he hated it?

"That was," he said, opening his eyes, "that was really something. Have I died?"

Winry was confused. "Have you _died_?"

"I must have," said Edward, "something as sweet as that couldn't exist outside of the afterlife."

Winry lost all her self control and roared. She had just created a chocoholic, and she was going to have to live with the consequences.

After the two got the cookies on the cookie sheet and in the oven--though Edward had stolen some chocolate chips from the batter,--Winry set the timer and the two went to the living room while the cookies baked.

"Edward," she said as she found herself a seat and gestured for Edward to do the same, "do you mind if I ask something that might be offensive?"

"You want to offend me?"

"No, I _don't_ want to offend you. That's why I asked, to make sure that you don't mind a difficult question."

Edward shrugged. "I don't mind." He sat down on a nearby chair and sunk into it as though he didn't know how to sit properly. Judging by his behavior that day, he probably didn't. "What is this thing? It wants to eat me!"

Winry chuckled yet again. She was bonding with the boy, and she wasn't sure if that was good, since they had to send him back. It would be easier if she didn't get emotionally attached, as he clearly wasn't the person they were meant to take into their home.

"It's not trying to eat you, Ed." She bit her tongue as she realized she had just shortened his name again. It really wasn't that important, so why was she making such a fuss over it? He was just so different from anyone she had met before. "That's a chair. You're supposed to sink into it because it feels good."

"That's weird. The things we sat on back home weren't...sinky...like this."

Winry smiled, but kept her lips clamped shut, having made the decision not to laugh. She'd laughed enough that day to cause him an inferiority complex. She cleared her throat. What if she offended him? Maybe it didn't matter, since he would be leaving, but she hated the idea that she might send him away with bad thoughts. The girl closed her eyes and sighed. Like it or not, she had to ask, so she would just blunder her way through one way or another.

"Edward, are you...are you...human?"

The boy didn't flinch, but answered in an unperturbed way. "No, I'm not."

She hadn't expected that answer at all. She had anticipated an angry "Of course!" or a confused "Why do you ask?". Even an annoyed "What makes you think I'm not?" would have made sense. Openly stating that he was not human wasn't what she had prepared herself for.

"Then...what are you?"

Edward shrugged and crossed his legs. He didn't seem disturbed by their conversation, as though he had expected it. "My people have always called ourselves 'the people'. I suppose that name originated back in our primitive days when we didn't have contact with other races. Other peoples have referred to us as 'star children'. I guess that's because our skin glows and theirs doesn't."

Winry's eyes were wide with wonder. An exchange student couldn't come from _that_ far away, could they? "Are you saying that you're...an alien...from another world?"

The boy buried his face in his hands and let his shoulders rise and fall in silent laughter. Was what she said funny, or was he self conscious? Maybe it was the latter. She had probably gone too far by making assumptions and stating it the way she had. Now he was probably embarrassed.

"I thought it was obvious," he said between laughs, "do you have people like me on this planet, or is this just Winry being Winry?"

Winry felt herself blushing. She had an alien in her house, he had freely admitted it, and now he was teasing her. She had never expected this to occur in her lifetime, but she had to laugh at bizarre it sounded. Edward not only claimed he was an alien, he acted like one in his ignorance of basic concepts, and he even _looked_ like one. Either someone was pulling an ingenious practical joke, or he was telling the truth. Somehow it was easier to believe that everything was true. There had never been any insincerity in Edward's face in any of the questions he had asked.

Her eyes opened wide as she realized something. If Edward was an alien, then sending him back would be difficult. It now made sense why Edward had worried about being exposed. He must have known about human hostility even though he had never been here before. Throwing Edward out could result in his death if he was captured by the authorities. The only way he could safely leave their home would be if his own people came and took him back, and she wasn't sure when –or if--that would happen. She would have to talk to Al. They had gotten themselves into more than they had thought. A whole lot more.

A ding sounded from the kitchen, and both heads looked up. Edward leapt out of his seat and charged for the kitchen yelling, "Chocolaaate!" Winry snickered and shook her head as she stood and followed the boy. Even being from outer space, he was adorable.

_**Feel free to review and comment and offer constructive criticism, but please remember to keep the criticism constructive. If you don't like something, at least be considerate enough to tell me why, and back it up with logic. Also, tell me what I did right so that I don't think I've failed at the whole thing. This is how you critique a person properly, though it seems like people aren't taught that. ((rolls eyes)) **_

_**Sorry to spew all that out, but people are being more nitpicky than usual on this fic, which is why I'm uploading the chapters two weeks apart instead of one week. I need enough time to get several chapters ahead of the readers to keep from getting discouraged, heh. I don't mind criticism, I welcome it actually since I'm planning to make this into a book once I finish the story and take the FMA references out of it, but be nice. Also, those of you who are my loyal readers, please don't go flaming the reviewers who seemed to have criticized me in the past, hehe, the real problem is not in my reviews. People talk to me through PMs and Instant Messaging too.**_

_**Anyway, I really hope you enjoyed that. Feel free to share your thoughts. I could really use them in order to turn this into a book. Even plot suggestions are welcome, though they might not be incorporated for a few chapters since I've written a few in advance, hehe. Thanks a bunch for reading, and I look forward to seeing you soon!**_


	3. Chapter 3

_**Okay, here's the next chapter for you. I know, it hasn't quite been two weeks, but I was getting impatient. I have to apologize to my beta for this chapter and the last one, AdventureAddict, because I didn't even wait for her to send the betaed version back, hehe. I'll edit and upload the chapter again once you send it, okay AA? It's just that I plan to turn this story into a book soon, and I'd rather get these chapters up sooner rather than later. Once I get all the chapters written, I'll be uploading them fairly quickly, so stay tuned, everyone, hehe. I'm writing it as fanfiction first in the hopes of getting my readers to spot plotholes and the like, so if you spot anything "off" about the story, or you have a question or a suggestion, feel free to review and say it. Again, be nice. Telling me that my story sucks doesn't help any of us, but telling me what could be improved definitely does, so don't be afraid to speak up!**_

_**Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist, though I'm tempted to tie Ed to a chair and see how long it takes him to get out of that position. That's not quite ownership, I know, but it'd be rather entertaining to watch.**_

He knew he had to be dead. The scents from that 'oven' thing could only be in the afterlife. Either that, or humans knew something about food that his people didn't. If so, he wasn't going home; from now on, chocolate was home.

He grabbed hold of the oven door, but his hand was smacked away, sending the rays on his hand rippling from the violent action. He pulled his hand away and cradled it in his other hand. First Winry had hit him with that small metal homing device, and now she was smacking him? Was she trying to hog the chocolate?

"Edward, don't touch," Winry said on seeing Edward's reaction, "It's hot. I don't want you to get burned."

The girl put a cover over her hand and grabbed the oven door. On opening, the heat rolled out and smacked his face. She hadn't lied about the temperature, it was hot in there.

"Isn't it dangerous to have a device like that in your home?"

"Not if you're careful," she said as she pulled out the cookie sheet and placed it on the counter. Edward's face fell as he stared at the hard, flat discs lining the tray.

"You killed the chocolate!" He began to pull at his hair even as his aura grew brighter.

"Killed the chocolate how?" Winry looked confused.

His hand waved over the cookies. "It melted and turned into these flat, hard...cow...excrements."

Winry rolled her eyes, but said nothing. He had thought she would have said something about his understanding the concept of cows, but maybe she had figured out he had seen cows on the train and examples of what cows left behind from the horse-drawn cart.

Winry sighed and turned toward him. "You're silly, you know that?"

He blinked. "How so?"

"Cookies are _supposed_ to be flat, hard discs. If they weren't, they'd be hard to chew."

"So can I eat one, or will I get sick?"

"No, you won't get sick," said Winry, pulling out a utensil with a flat, slotted end, "They turned out perfect."

"That's perfect? Okay, but I still say it looks like something I shouldn't eat." He reached for a cookie, but Winry smacked his hand again.

"Edward, for goodness' sakes, be patient!" Winry blew a strand of hair out of her face. "We have to wait for them to cool."

Edward pulled his hair again. "You mean I have to wait _longer_? Aaagh!"

Winry rolled her eyes. "Not much longer, Mr. Impatient, just enough for them to cool. Let's put them on this cooling rack..."

He couldn't wait any longer now that he smelled the hot chocolate smell wafting at him. He grabbed a cookie off the tray when Winry's back was turned and took a bite. He sighed. "Ahhh...you were right, I hadn't lived until I'd eaten a chocolate chip cookie."

Winry's head snapped around and her eyes widened. "Edward! You were supposed to wait!"

Edward panicked, knowing what Winry did to people when mad, but he refused to give up his cookie, so he shoved the rest of it in his mouth. "Sorry! Sorry! No hitting!" He waved his hands in front of him. Winry's face softened.

"Don't you know the meaning of rules?" she said and held up the object Edward feared. She wouldn't hit him with that small metal thing again, would she? He yelped and staggered back a couple steps, and Winry laughed. Edward choked on the cookie bits in his mouth. How could she find this funny?

* * *

At that moment, the front door opened and Al stepped into the house, leading a girl behind him. Winry and Edward were making so much noise that it was easy for Al to find them. "What the--?" he said on seeing the scene in the kitchen.

Winry looked at him, smiled, and lowered her wrench. "Me and Edward were just…getting acquainted." Al glanced over to Edward for confirmation, but only saw him shiver and glance at Winry. He had been right in allowing her to stay with him. She could handle him by herself.

"Al," Winry said, "We need to talk about Edw--"

She was interrupted by a scream from behind Al, and all eyes turned. The girl Al brought home was standing there with her hand outstretched, pointing at Edward. "He—he's _glowing_!" It looked like the girl was faint, so Al took a precautionary measure and stood next to her, putting an arm around her to keep her balanced.

Everyone stood still for several moments, mouths hanging open, no one knowing what to say. Edward broke the tension by saying, "I swallowed some chemicals when I was five. I was a bad boy."

Winry chuckled, followed by Al soon after. Rose's facial expression didn't change much, but a slight tic formed in the corner of her mouth, so Edward's remark had softened her, even if she was still nervous.

Edward reached around Winry as though trying to grab something. She noticed what he was doing and smacked his hand, causing him to jerk it away. Al raised an eyebrow.

"What's happening?"

"He likes chocolate," said Winry, "_Really_ likes chocolate, and he's trying to steal the cookies before they're cool."

"Hot cookies won't hurt me," said Edward, holding his hand guardedly while stepping toward Winry once again. "I already ate one and it didn't hurt."

Winry rolled her eyes. "That's beside the point, Ed. You're supposed to let them cool."

"Why?"

Winry blinked. "I—I don't know, actually. I was just taught to do that."

"Down with tradition!" Edward yelled, lunging for the cookie sheet, only to have Winry step in his way and threaten him yet again. Al watched the two of them struggle, rolled his eyes, and sighed.

"Can we continue this _after_ we talk? We have another guest." Al gestured toward Rose. "She seems more confused than we are, so I think it would be considerate to get this problem sorted out."

"You're right, Al," said Winry, shoving Edward away and sending him crashing into the wall. Her shoulders jumped in silent laughter as the boy glared at her, and she turned to Al. "Let's get this over with."

The four walked to the living room and found places to sit, except for Edward, who was staring at an empty chair. Winry rolled her eyes. "It's not going to eat you, Ed. Just sit down."

Edward flinched. "Uh…n-no thanks. Squishy is weird. I prefer the floor." Edward plopped on the floor, leaned his back against a chair, and Winry shook her head.

"Do I want to know?" asked Al.

"Probably not," Winry chuckled. Al tried to smile, but could only grimace, and even that turned into a neutral expression shortly after. He had too much on his mind, and he had to sort this out, but where to start?

Edward sneezed, breaking the monotony of the silence, and his aura flared up momentarily. A corner of Al's mouth raised up. That had been slightly amusing, even if a bit weird. That glow coming off of his skin was eerie.

"Um," said a timid voice coming from Al's left, "…How do you do that?" Al knew Rose was speaking, and he followed her gaze until he was looking at Edward. It was amazing that she had spoken to him, considering how she had acted before. She wasn't exactly shy, but the sight of Edward brought out the timid child in her.

Edward's head snapped up. "How do I do what?"

Rose waved her hand in search of words to describe her feelings. "How do you do that—that glowing thing?"

"Oh, that," said Edward, rolling his eyes. He looked at the ground and huffed, and then back up at Rose. "Would you believe me if I told you I played with electricity as a kid?"

Rose blinked for a couple moments, and then spoke again. "Then what was that in the kitchen about you swallowing chemicals?"

Edward stroked his chin. After a moment of silence, he snapped his fingers and said, "I swallowed the chemicals, and the electricity made them work."

A quick look at Rose's face told Al that she didn't believe him, but was being polite. Looking the other way, he saw Winry clamp her hand over her mouth to hide the chuckles threatening to escape. She didn't believe it either. Al sighed. This was getting nowhere..

He cleared his throat. "I think you all know we have a problem." He glanced around the room to assure himself everyone was listening. "We sent for one exchange student, and yet we have two." He stopped and looked at Winry, hoping for support, but she gave none.

"We don't want to alarm either of you," Al said, "but we can only support one of you. I'm afraid we can't keep you both."

Al paused to gauge the reactions of those in the room. Rose fidgeted with the hem of her dress, and Edward covered his face with his hands and shook his head. He seemed to be taking it the hardest.

"And…" Al said, feeling less certain by the second, "Rose has documents to prove she was sent to us, but we have nothing from you, Edward."

Edward pulled his hands from his face and stared at Al in fear. Al lowered his gaze guiltily. He really hated confrontations, someone always got hurt, but Edward was clearly a fraud here, so he had to go. Rose shouldn't suffer for whatever Edward had done to steal her place, and it would be a relief to get rid of the strange glowing boy anyway.

Winry tapped him on his arm, and he looked up into her face. She was frowning all the way up to her eyes. "Al…" she said, "I know what you're thinking, and I would have agreed before…but we can't kick Ed out."

Al blinked in response. Winry was defending the boy she had been so angry at earlier? She had laughed with him a few minutes prior, and her sudden change puzzled him. Winry wasn't the sort of person to be rash often. That warranted at least listening to her side of the story.

"Why do you say that?"

"Because…" her voice trailed off. Winry licked her lips and turned to face the boy on the floor. "Edward, do you want to tell him yourself?"

Edward raised his eyebrows. "Tell him what?"

"You know…like…where you're from."

Edward rolled his eyes. "Isn't that obvious?"

"It wasn't to me."

"Tch," Ed said, speaking through the side of his mouth. "I thought that was a Winry thing."

"What's a Winry thing?" Al asked.

Winry and Edward exchanged a look between them, then turned to face Al. "Al, it's...it's not safe for Edward to...to leave here." She bit her lip. Al raised an eyebrow and knew there was something she and Edward needed to say that was difficult.

"Edward...he...he's...an alien."

Al's eyebrows shot up. Had he heard right? "An...alien?"

Winry nodded, so his hearing was fine, but it seemed unbelievable. He had wondered if the strange glowing boy had come from another world, but he hadn't expected his suspicion to be confirmed. Winry saying what he had not spoken felt like a smack in the face. She didn't believe anything that happened to cross her field of vision.

Al placed his hand over his eyes. This was too much to deal with in one day. What was an alien doing in his house? "You're positive? He's really an alien? From outer space?"

"Positive," said Winry.

A whimper came from the other side of the room, and Al turned to see Rose biting her nails. This whole ordeal was more than he wanted to deal with, but it was affecting her even worse. Her fearful eyes darted around the room, particularly hovering on Edward and looking away whenever he looked at her. Al knew he would have to do something about this situation, since no one else knew what to do.

He turned to face Edward. "So, if you're an alien, would you tell me why you're here?"

Edward looked very uncomfortable. He cleared his throat and said, "I—My people have been sending out ambassadors to other planets..." His voice trailed off.

"Why?" Al prodded.

Edward raised his head and looked at Al. He blinked harder than normal and jerked his head away as though trying to hold back tears, but Al was sure Edward wouldn't cry. He seemed stronger than that.

"My home star is burning up its fuel."

All stars burnt up their fuel, so how was that unusual? Stars were meant to be able to live off their own fuel supply for a long time, until they burned out and...

Al's eyes widened at the realization of what Edward's words meant. "Your star...is dying?"

Edward closed his eyes and nodded, very sad about the topic. If a star died, then so did the planets around it. That meant Edward would lose his home.

"So..." Al wasn't sure what to say, let alone how to be tactful. "Um, how long does your star have left to live?"

"A few Earth months, I think." Edward opened his eyes and looked at Al. He rubbed at his eye. So Edward had been crying, though he had been trying not to show it. "I wasn't told exact figures, only what to look for here."

"What are you looking for?" Al hoped Edward would answer. That could potentially be classified information, but he wanted Edward to tell them anyway.

Edward's aura decreased in intensity, and he wrapped his arms around himself. "I'm cold," he said, "Excuse me."

Al stared after Edward as he left the room. That had not gone according to plan. Nothing in this day had, and he knew this was only the beginning.

_**Well, there you go. Shorter chapter than usual, but hopefully satisfactory. My next chapter is already written but unedited, so hopefully I'll get that one up in a few days as well...hopefully I'll get the entire story written in a few days for that matter, hehe, but we'll see. Once again, if you have any thoughts, send them my way. If you don't, you don't have to review, but I hope you enjoyed the chapter at least. Thanks, and have a nice day!**_


	4. Chapter 4

_**Well, that took a little longer to get this chapter finished than I thought. I would start editing it, and then a few minutes later be distracted by something. Then I start again the next day, only to have the same thing happen. ((shakes head)) I'm pitiful, aren't I? Hehe...Anyway, this chapter's been edited at least once now, so it's good enough to at least read. Some of the phrases are a bit iffy to me, and I will be editing this whole story once it's written, so don't be afraid to tell me what I need to work on. I could really use the insight. If you don't have any insight, just telling me what you liked ((or hated, but hopefully I'm writing the story well enough to make people not hate it, hehe)) or telling me what confused you is helpful too. Lets me know what my audience is thinking, hehe.**_

_**Disclaimer: You know, in all honesty, I don't think we really have to put these before each and every chapter, it's just a habit we've gotten into on this site for some reason. ((rolls eyes)) Put it on the first chapter and it's understood to refer to the entire story, heh, but yeah...I only keep doing it on every chapter simply because it gives me an excuse to poke fun at it. So...pay up the tunabagoos, Squidby! ((That's alien speak for 'I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist'.))...What do you mean, 'Aliens don't talk like that'? How would YOU know?**_

Winry looked at Al disapprovingly. He normally handled misunderstandings quite well, but he had botched this one up. It was time to take things into her own hands and hopefully repair some of the damage. She got up without a word to anyone and left the room.

She guessed Edward would be in his bedroom since all his possessions were there and he could shut the door and be alone, which would allow him to lose himself in thought. That's where she would go if she were in his position, since she could relate. She had felt so alone after her parents passed on, and again after her grandmother died a year ago. It had been a relief when Al agreed to move in with her, even if they had to pretend to be a couple the country folks from gossiping.

Winry stood before Edward's door, but she hesitated. She wanted to help the boy, but part of him scared her, the non-human part. She closed her eyes and sighed. One could argue that no part of him was human, but his heart seemed human to her. It didn't make sense, but she was growing to trust Edward. She felt herself raise her fist and knock.

Something in the room fell and Winry heard a startled "Wha--?" She had scared him, so maybe he didn't yet know what knocking was.

"It's just me, Edward, I didn't mean to scare you."

There was a pause that felt like eternity, though judging by the number of heartbeats she counted, it had been only a few seconds. Finally, a confused voice came through the wood of the door. "...Winry?"

"Yes, may I come in?"

Another pause, and then, "Um...okay..."

She didn't wait for him to rethink his statement. She grabbed the doorknob and swung the door open. Edward was sitting on his bed, having accepted the its bounciness, and had wrapped himself in his cloak. His hood was down, allowing her to see his face, and his suitcase had fallen off the bed and scattered his clothes everywhere. If the disorganization of his appearance and belongings were anything to go by, then his mind was frazzled.

"Edward...are you okay?"

He blinked hard and turned away. "I'm fine." He pulled his hood up over his head and knelt onto the floor to grab his clothes and force them back into the suitcase.

Winry took a step toward him to help, but then stopped. Edward was wearing his cloak and packing his suitcase, yet he only wore that cloak for traveling or for being out in public. He wasn't planning on leaving, was he?

"Edward, what do you think you're doing?" The boy sighed and continued packing his suitcase as though he hadn't heard what she'd said. Winry growled under her breath and walked up to Edward, pulling his hood down so she could see his face.

"I _said_ 'what are you doing?'"

He blinked a couple times as though shocked by her forcefulness and turned away. Winry kept a fast grip on the hood of his cloak. "I've troubled you and Al enough for one day."

Winry's eyes widened and she dropped down to her knees. "You mean you're _leaving_? Tell me you're not serious!"

Edward turned back to her, and this time Winry could see the sadness in his eyes. "I don't belong here, Winry. That other girl does, not me."

"Edward," she said, feeling annoyed, "We'll figure something out, but don't leave!"

He turned and looked her in the eye. "It's going to get worse. This was only the first day, and look at what has already happened! Do you think things will magically improve?"

"But..." Winry's voice trailed off and her lip started to tremble. She bit her lip to keep her emotions from showing. "But...what about your mission?"

"What about it?"

"Well..." she hesitated, "...how will you accomplish it if you leave?"

Edward snorted. "You don't even know what my mission is."

Winry hung her head. That was true, but she still cared. She trusted Edward, though she couldn't say why, but whatever the reason for him being here must have been important. "No, I don't know," she said, "I wish I did."

Edward folded his arms and rested his chin on them as Winry placed a hand on his shoulder. "Why do you care?" he said.

Winry felt slightly insulted at that remark. She was trying to help, yet he wasn't allowing her to. "Why shouldn't I care? I don't know why it matters to me, it just does."

"But aren't I just some strange creature from outer space to you? Do you honestly care what happens to me? Al doesn't."

"Al does care," she said indignantly, "he's just scared. Give him time and he'll warm up to you."

"He's not going to give me enough time for that." Edward placed his hands in his lap and turned his head to look down at them.

"He will if I have anything to say about it," said Winry, causing Edward to shiver. She grinned. She hated to admit it, but she liked to see her mean streak cause people to cower in fear. "I'd have more influence if I knew your mission."

There was silence as both parties waited for the other to speak. Edward sighed. "You seriously don't know what you're getting into."

* * *

"What _was_ he?" said Rose after Winry left the room. She shook visibly and wrapped her arms around herself. Al understood her feelings. It was difficult to feel safe around the unknown.

"I suspected he was an alien," said Al, "but I never expected Winry to confirm it."

"You just let someone you thought was an alien into your home? Why did you do that?"

"Err.." Al rubbed the back of his head; his hair turned into knots in his fingers. "We didn't know what he was until we got home. He was rather sneaky."

"You're going to get rid of him, right?" Rose raised her hands to her mouth and bit her fingernails. "I'd be scared to live in the same house as him."

"We're working on it," said Al. "He's clearly a fraud in this, and he will go, but we have to be careful to not anger him. That could have bad repercussions."

Winry appeared on the stairs. "Al, may I talk to you in private?" Al and Rose looked at each other and nodded. He promised he would be back soon left the room.

"So what's the problem?" said Al as soon as he and Winry were alone upstairs.

"Isn't it obvious?" said Winry, disgusted, "I know what you're doing, Al, and I don't like it. You should be trying to comfort Rose, not turning her against Edward. He's all alone in this world, and he needs all the support he can get."

Al crossed his arms in front of his chest. "But we know nothing about him. How can we trust someone who won't trust us?"

Winry rolled her eyes. "Trust is _earned_, Al. You can't just expect him to open up because you say so. You have to prove yourself trustworthy."

"That applies the other way around, you know."

"Hmm?"

"He hasn't exactly earned my trust yet."

Winry dropped her voice to a murmur. "Well, maybe if you'd just talk to him..."

"Talk to him? Didn't you hear me downstairs trying to do that?" Al waved his hand toward the staircase even as the pitch of his voice rose. "I admire you for tbeing noble and taking in someone who has 'underdog' written all over him, but I'd appreciate it if you didn't try to make me do the same thing."

Winry's mouth dropped and she stepped back. Al's stomach turned into a knot. Why did he have to blame his problems on the ones he loved? It wasn't as though Winry's day had been better than his. He clenched and released his fists. He should apologize, but he couldn't do it outright. He would have to do the best he could.

"I'm sorry," he said, "but I can't trust someone who won't even reveal his mission. He could be here to scout out our planet's weak points and inform his people so they can invade us."

"That's not why he's here, Al."

"How do you know?"

"Because...he told me."

Al's eyes bulged out. "He told you? Why didn't you say so?"

"You never asked."

Al clenched his fist again and growled; he knew she was right. He couldn't get answers if he didn't ask questions, so it was entirely his fault. It was still annoying though.

"So...what did he tell you?"

Winry licked her lips and her eyes darted back and forth. Knowing Winry, that meant whatever she was hiding was troublesome. His muscles tensed as he prepared himself. "Um, would you...like to sit down?"

Al shook his head. Whenever he sat down for a discussion, he got bad news. He knew that he couldn't stop bad news from coming by standing up, but at least he felt more in control.

Winry sighed and dropped her head. "Fine, have it your way." She looked back up at him. "Remember how Edward mentioned his star was dying?" Al nodded. "He said that it wasn't going to be long before that occurred, and his people don't have enough time to terraform a new planet. So, his people are sending out scouts, but not to exploit anyone. He's looking for a temporary place to live where the natives won't kill his people."

Al was silent for several moments, not knowing what to say, but finally asked, "How many of his race are there?"

Winry scratched her chin. "I think he said something around five or six million."

Al's jaw dropped. "That's all? For an entire race?"

Winry shrugged. "That's what he said."

Al headed toward his bedroom; he needed to be alone where he could think. He was sure the earth could hold a few million extra people without a problem, but how would the two races interact? Humans were hostile creatures. Even he and Winry were having trouble with this situation, and they were handling it better than most. At least they hadn't pulled a gun on Edward and demanded he state his business.

Al opened his bedroom door and plopped onto his bed. He hadn't meant to be as mistrusting as he had seemed, but they already had an obligation to their official exchange student, so they couldn't make her leave. And now they were holding the lives of an entire race in the balance, so they couldn't make Edward leave either. He knew Edward was telling the truth in everything he had said; it radiated from the boy like the light surrounding him.

He looked across the room. It was unfair he had the biggest room all to himself while Winry stayed in a smaller room. He'd understood the reasoning for her decision, as this had been her grandmother's room, and she couldn't bear to leave this room empty, but it still felt wrong for him to have so much space all to himself. He didn't use it all.

Al's eyes widened and he sat up. One reason they couldn't support more than one exchange student was because of the lack of space, but if they moved Edward into Al's room and Rose into Edward's room, the space problem would be solved. He would have to adapt to Edward's glowiness, which might be annoying at night, but maybe a blindfold would cut out the light. Now they only had to figure out how to feed both exchange students without making anybody starve.

He pushed himself out of bed and opened his door. He needed to talk to Edward to see if he had any ideas. Poor Rose had been so afraid of Edward and he hadn't helped the situation any, but that problem could be solved later. In the meantime, they needed to figure out how to keep both of them.

Al knocked on Edward's door. There was a gasp from the other side, and then, "...Winry?"

"No, it's Al."

"Oh."

Al smirked. This boy needed some education on Earth behaviors if he wanted to live here. "May I come in?" he asked.

"Oh, um...sure." Edward sounded scattered, but Al shook it off as Edward being Edward. He turned the doorknob and opened the door to find Edward sitting on his bed, wearing his cloak, and his suitcase open, yet neatly packed, at his feet.

A shocked glance between the suitcase and the boy and Al said, "You're not trying to leave, are you?"

Edward shook his head. "Winry told me to stay here until she talked to you."

"Oh for goodness' sake!" Al stepped into the room. He massaged his temples to alleviate the headache he felt coming on. "I never thought you would make a rash decision like that."

"You don't know me very well," Edward said with a hint of a smile, "I always make rash decisions. It took my people a long time to decide I was capable of fulfilling this mission because of that." Edward turned away from Al. "I could really use some chocolate right now."

Al chuckled, remembering Winry's words about Edward's fondness for chocolate. The two had made chocolate chip cookies together, and the cookies were forgotten in the kitchen, still on the cookie sheet. From all the commotion earlier, he suspected the cookies hadn't made it to the cooling rack, but they would taste just as good.

"How about we grab some of those chocolate chip cookies you guys made and talk things over downstairs? It would be more pleasant to discuss things over cookies."

Edward's face lit up and he looked up at Al just before jumping to his feet. Yep, Edward was a strange one, but seemed easily motivated--or perhaps manipulated--when chocolate was concerned. It seemed strange that Edward's race had never discovered something like chocolate on their own if they liked it so much, though that could just be Edward who liked it so much, rather than his race.

They walked downstairs to the kitchen, Al grabbing a cookie and handing it to Edward, only to find out that he had already grabbed several cookies from the tray, but Edward took Al's offered cookie anyway. He seemed more than willing to eat any and all cookies he could. Al shook his head. Edward was a strange one, but Winry was right, he didn't seem at all threatening.

"So, Edward, I was wondering if you could help me with something," said Al through a bite of cookie, "The reasons that we can't support two exchange students are because we don't have enough space for two and because we can't provide enough food for two. However, I have the biggest bedroom in the house, so we could solve the space issue by moving you in with me and giving Rose your bedroom, but I don't know what to do about the food. Do you have any ideas?"

Edward scratched the back of his head. "How do your people get food? From the little I've studied of other worlds, it seems different with every race."

"I suppose it would be," said Al, finishing the last bite of his cookie. "We have a system where everyone does the work they are best at and relies on everyone else to do the same. Then when people use our services, they pay us for doing so, which basically proves we did our share of work. We can then take that pay, we call it 'money', to a store and buy whatever we want."

"Ah, that system," said Edward, "I've read about that one. It's not very efficient."

"It seems to work for us," said Al with a shrug.

"For now it does," said Edward, "Hopefully your people think up other ways to live, because that system never lasts."

Al stopped and pondered what Edward had said. He couldn't change his country's economic system, but it was interesting to think about what it would be like if his country changed. Would everyone in the world be farmers, or was there a better way of supporting one another?

"So that means I need to do useful work and get paid for my efforts," said Edward, "but I can't be seen by the people here in case they're hostile. Is there any way around that?"

If Edward was willing to work, that would solve their food problems. It would help if Rose offered to earn money too, but he wasn't going to ask her, since she might not have much time to balance work and study. Edward thought he could though, or he wouldn't have offered.

"If you create something that I can take away from here and sell, then no one would see you," said Al, "but I don't know your skills."

Edward stroked his chin. "Are your people interested in the arts? My people have some unique methods of expression."

"Yes, we are," said Al, "But stick to conventional formats and don't get carried away so that you get yourself noticed as not being from around here."

Edward crossed his arms in a mock indignant fashion. "I can adapt to others' rules, It's not _that_ difficult. Give me something written on human art styles, and I'll implement it into my own."

Al couldn't help but smile. He hadn't seen any of Edward's artwork, but he assumed that it would probably be decent work if Edward was offering to do it to support himself. It was worth a try, so he would pick up a book from the library on art styles as soon as he could. In the meantime, it was time to get Edward and Rose settled in.

"Okay, Edward, that settles it. We'll keep both you and Rose and hope things work out. I'll go grab your things and move them into my room...and perhaps you could help Rose move into her room?" Al leaned forward slightly and raised an eyebrow, hoping Edward would take the hint. Those two needed to bond if they were to live in the same house, and the best way would be to have them work together.

"No problem," said Edward, "I'll try to get her to do something other than bite her fingers around me." Edward turned away and Al chuckled at Ed's use of the word 'fingers' instead of 'fingernails'. Perhaps his Amestrian wasn't as flawless as Al had first thought.

Edward turned back around. "Oh and Al?...Thanks." Edward offered a light smile, which Al returned, and Edward turned and headed out of the kitchen, leaving light trails dissipating in his wake. Life had just gotten much more interesting.

_**Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed that. Feel free to let me know what you think if you have any thoughts, hehe. If you don't have any thoughts to spare, then you probably need them more than I do, heh. Hopefully my next chapter will be uploaded sooner than this one was. ((rolls eyes)) Depends on my editing speed. The good news is that, for the first time in my life, I created an OUTLINE for this story, hehe. That means it won't be dying halfway through as my stories have a habit of doing, because I know exactly what's going to happen from beginning to end. This one was just too important to me to allow it to die like that, so I finally took some initiative to prevent that from happening. Proud of me? Hehe...**_

_**In any case, see you all soon!**_


	5. Chapter 5

_**Thought it about time I update this story. I was rather surprised at how long I took to upload this, actually. I blinked and a week vanished, hehe. Well, a heck of a lot happened this past week, including getting my purse stolen, which took me a few days to regain my sanity. ((shakes head)) Craziness...anyway, at least I managed to get this updated, hehe. On the brighter side, I found a cool program that seems to be making my writing easier called Scrivener. Any of you who have a Mac, you should seriously try it out. It's awesome!**_

_**Anyway, on with the chapter...**_

_**Disclaimer: Ummm...do you seriously not know what I'm disclaiming by now? If you don't, you need to go back to...um...disclaimer school! Yes, if you don't know what disclaimers are by now, then you must've failed disclaimer school.**_

Alphonse couldn't help himself as he moved Edward's things into his room. It was tempting to look at Edward's things, and since they were moving in together, Al would soon see all the objects anyway. Surely it was okay to speed up the process as long as he didn't play with the objects.

He held a small, round thing in his hand; it was the shape of a flat egg. It was metallic gray, and felt cool in his hand. It was probably a machine, though he didn't know what it would be used for, let alone how to activate it. It was completely smooth, not a hint of a seam or a button anywhere, so thinking the object to be a machine was only his best guess.

He put down the metal egg and picked up a cylindrical thing that was about as long as his hand from the tip of his middle finger to the base of his palm. It resembled a telescope. It had an eyepiece like a telescope would, but when he looked through, it didn't magnify whatever happened to be nearby. He had seen myriads of stars, better than the average telescope would reveal...but he was indoors…and it was daytime. That instrument puzzled him, so he put it down and went to the next item.

Edward had taken off his cloak and had returned it to his old bedroom before going downstairs to confront Rose, so Al took the opportunity to explore it. At first, it appeared to be an ordinary cloak, but upon picking it up and running it through his fingers, he realized that it wasn't. The material it was made out of was heavy for its size and somewhat rubbery, yet it was light enough to look like normal fabric; it even had fabric texture on it. Al rubbed his thumb across the material as if doing so would explain some of its mysteries. Edward's race must have studied humans and created this cloak to fool them into thinking Edward was one of them, because it looked convincing. The texture seemed to be painted onto the material, but Al had no idea how one could paint such fine detail and have it be able to stand up to everyday wear and tear without cracking off .

Someone chuckled in the doorway and Al snapped his head up, his heart beating rapidly at the thought of getting caught snooping. There stood Edward, arms crossed and an amused look on his face. "So I take it you find my stuff oh-so-fascinating?"

Al blushed and turned away from Edward, hoping he could find an excuse for what he had been doing, but his mind was blank and refused to rescue him. That traitorous mind, failing him in time of need. Edward chuckled again and pulled the cloak out of Al's hand.

"I've got nothing to hide from you, Al, and I don't blame you for being curious, but you could ask before you snoop."

Al looked up at Edward, who still seemed quite amused. He was just making this harder. Al swallowed the saliva that had accumulated in his mouth and muttered, "Y-Yes, I'm sorry."

At this point Edward laughed and slapped Al on the back. "You've got nothing to apologize for, silly. Just make sure you don't break anything when you snoop." Edward swung his cloak back at Al, setting the hood so that the cloak would hang off Al's head, and then turned and exited the room. Al stared after him for a moment before pulling the cloak off his head and putting it away. Edward was very strange.

* * *

Rose didn't want to be within twenty feet of the strange alien boy, but when Edward had come offering to help, there hadn't been much she could do. She had wanted to refuse, but both Al and Winry had ganged up on her and insisted they cooperate with each other, so she had consented to letting him help, but she didn't like it.

Both her suitcases were open on her bed, and Edward was going through them, pulling out items and asking her about them. Rose stayed as far away from him as possible and leaned against the wall, refusing to help put her own things away if that meant going near the glowing thing. She wished he would leave. Al had assured her that Edward would be gone soon, so what had changed his mind? Maybe she should call the agency and get transferred to another home, since she was sure she'd never be comfortable living here if a glowing humanoid occupied it.

"What's this?" Edward held up an item from the suitcase, and Rose blushed. Apparently Edward had never seen a bra before, but Rose couldn't fathom how the women from his race dealt with the problem of breast support otherwise. Maybe they were built differently and didn't need them.

"Uh, never mind that," Rose said as she held her hand out in front of her. "Just, uh, toss it to me and I'll take care of it myself."

"Fair enough." Edward wadded the bra into a ball and chucked it toward Rose, her barely catching it before it hit her. She straightened up and shook her head. This was insane. She had wanted to gain an understanding of more of her world, not of other worlds too. She sighed and placed the bra in a nearby dresser drawer and returned to her post against the wall.

Edward had slung a couple dresses over his arm and was hanging them up. She had to admit that the boy did learn quickly. It hadn't taken long for her to explain to him how dresses were hung in the closet on coat hangers, even though each of those items seemed fairly new to him. He was familiar with clothing, but his people must not have treated clothing the same way humans did.

Rose watched as Edward pulled a small, rectangular object out of her suitcase and her heart nearly stopped. Had she remembered that was in there, she would not have let Edward rifle through her things until it had been removed. "What's this?" said Edward as he turned the object toward her. Rose couldn't speak. It hurt too much.

Edward turned the object toward himself and looked at it again. "It looks like a depiction of some person. Is this someone you know?" He raised his eyes to look at her and his stare locked onto hers.

Rose sighed and slid down the wall until she was seated on the floor. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "That's my boyfriend," she said.

Edward looked at the picture again, then back at Rose. "Shouldn't this picture make you happy? You seem quite sad."

"My...My boyfriend...he disappeared..."

"Disappeared how?" said Edward.

"I don't know!" she snapped, "He's just gone! He left on a journey a long time ago and never came back!"

Edward flinched at her harsh tone, and she took a sick sense of accomplishment out of seeing him react. If nothing else, at least she could take out her troubles on him.

"Is it normal for him to disappear like that?" asked Edward. Rose sighed and lowered her face so she wasn't looking at Edward. Why wouldn't he drop the subject? Couldn't he tell that it hurt to talk about it? Rose swallowed and shook her head. She knew her boyfriend well enough to know that he wouldn't disappear without a good reason.

"What's his name?" said Edward. Rose growled under her breath and clenched her fists. Why wouldn't Ed shut up?

She sighed. "His name is Kain."

Edward nodded silently and held the picture close as he shut his eyes. Rose looked up and grimaced as she saw that his aura had brightened. It was creepy to see his skin glow, but it was worse to see his aura grow and shrink with his mood. What was he feeling? Was she safe? Should she find a way to get away from him while she could?

Before she could decide, Edward opened his eyes and looked at her. His aura returned to normal as he spoke. "I'm sorry, I can't make a good connection, but he's still alive."

Rose raised an eyebrow, but didn't dare speak. Maybe his strange aura gave him unusual abilities. It sounded stupid to her, but it was just as reasonable to assume that as to assume there were glowing aliens.

Edward looked at her and a tic formed in the corner of his mouth. "What's the matter? Don't your people understand mind-to-mind communication?"

Rose lowered her face once again and cleared her throat. "Humans generally aren't telepathic."

"Telepathic? Is that your word for it?" Rose nodded, so Edward continued speaking. "Okay, I was using my...telepathic-ness...to find your boyfriend. I can feel him; I know he's still alive, but the connection was terrible, so I don't know where he is."

Edward frowned and approached Rose. He placed his hand on her shoulder and closed his eyes as his aura again grew brighter. Rose stiffened on impulse, knowing he had to be using his telepathy again, and she didn't like the idea. It felt wrong to be around someone who had inhuman abilities like that, whether he had good intentions or not.

She felt a hand press to her forehead, and she looked up to see it, but saw nothing. Edward's hand was still on her shoulder, and the other one supported his kneeling position on the floor. Still, that hand on her forehead felt very real, even though she couldn't see it. She tensed even more as she felt the hand push itself through her skull and inside her. It didn't hurt, but she couldn't shake the feeling that she was being invaded somehow. Was Edward doing this? Could this be his telepathy at work? She had never known telepathy to manifest itself as an invisible hand, but Edward _was_an alien, so who knew what his abilities would do?

The hand inside her rifled through her mind. She could feel it grab at things and pull at long-buried memories, and she wished it would stop. She couldn't think of a way to make it leave, but she hoped that it would stop soon, especially once it saw how much she didn't want it there. If this really was Edward, wouldn't he care how she felt?

_You hate me, don't you?_

Rose's eyes went wide and she clapped her hands over her ears. That voice had been clear in her mind, but she knew it hadn't come through her ears. It had sounded like Edward's voice, but she could see that he had not spoken aloud.

She refused to respond to the voice, and she clamped her eyes shut as though that would help. He needed to leave.

_I'm not going to hurt you._

Rose shook her head furiously. She didn't care whether he was planning to hurt her, she just didn't like being invaded. Couldn't he see that? Maybe this was common practice in his world since they could all read each other's minds, but not in hers.

_I'm only trying to help._

Rose threw back her head and shouted, "I don't care! Get out of my mind!" The invisible hand withdrew itself from inside her skull and Rose opened her eyes. Edward's aura returned to it's normal vibrancy, and he opened his eyes to look at her.

"Why do you hate me?"

Her body stiffened at the sound of those words. That had been almost exactly what the voice in her head had said, and Edward's repeating it confirmed her thoughts: the voice in her head had been Edward's.

Rose clenched her fists and turned toward the door so she wouldn't have to look at Edward. Those eyes of his bore into her soul almost as badly as that invisible hand thing of his did. "No one would like getting their mind invaded," she spat.

"I'm sorry," he said, "It's perfectly acceptable in my world to probe another's mind." Rose had guessed that, but she still didn't think it was a good enough excuse to get her forgiveness. It would take a miracle to get her to accept his presence here.

Rose shrugged his hand off of her shoulder and jumped to her feet as she bolted out the door. Hopefully he didn't plan on following her, because she didn't want to have anything more to do with him. She was tired of being here, and she was going to march downstairs, find the telephone, and call the exchange student agency to get herself transferred. Maybe in the process she could report Edward to the authorities and let them deal with him. That would teach him.

"Rose? Is something the matter?" Rose spun around at the voice and looked with relief into Winry's face. The crazy blond had seemed insane when they had first met, but she was the only other woman in the house, and so they shared a special connection that no man could relate to. Rose blinked hard and tears flowed out of her eyes. She was confused and angry, and now she was angry at herself for crying.

"Aw, Rose, you're overwhelmed!" Winry wrapped her arms around the frustrated girl. After a moment of surprise, Rose relaxed and returned the hug, then buried her face in Winry's shoulder and let loose her tears. Winry tightened her embrace and stayed silent as sobs wracked Rose's body. At least someone understood.

When Rose finally calmed down, Winry pushed her away so they looked into each other's faces. "Now," she said, "Care to explain?"

Rose sniffed and brought her hand up to wipe away the last of the tears. It had felt so good to get those emotions out, but she was still scared, and she wasn't sure Winry could help further, especially if she planned to keep that alien in this house. Maybe Edward had brainwashed Winry into doing as he wished. He might be able to do that, since he certainly had the power to probe into people's minds. Maybe he had started brainwashing her as well, and it was only a matter of time before she was completely under his spell.

Winry ran her fingers through Rose's hair affectionately to calm her down. There was nothing threatening about Winry, unless one counted her temper. Rose wasn't sure if Edward had tricked her into doing what he wanted, but one could clearly see Winry's heart was in it, and she had no ill intentions. Even though Winry being on Edward's side made Rose feel ill, she felt slightly comforted that Winry wasn't evil.

"I know Edward scares you," said Winry. Rose started looked up into Winry's face. How had Winry known what she was thinking? Surely she wasn't telepathic as well. Winry smiled at her reaction and chuckled. "It's obvious from how you've behaved since you came home. None of this was fair to you. We didn't see it coming either."

Rose tried to speak, but her voice sounded watery, and she felt childish for showing her emotion so fully. "Why are you keeping him if you didn't intend for him to come?"

Winry sighed and looked at the ground before returning her gaze to Rose. "A few minutes ago, I would have asked the same question." She bit her lip and turned to look up the stairs as though anticipating Edward's arrival on their conversation, but seeing as how he didn't show, she turned back to Rose and continued speaking. "Edward has no insincerity in his voice or his eyes. You can tell when someone is innocent. Talk to him. He's got an interesting story to tell."

"But-" Rose protested, "But, I don't think I can trust him." She shook her head even as she closed her eyes to stop more tears from coming. It was enough that she had gotten Winry's shoulder wet with her previous tears, she didn't need to do more and make Winry think she was a crybaby.

"Why not?" asked Winry.

Rose started to speak, but was interrupted by another voice. "Probably because I'm unfamiliar with Earth customs and don't understand privacy as you see it." Both Rose and Winry turned to see Edward standing on the stairs, a very sad expression on his face. He acknowledged them with a nod, and he turned away from them as if to go back upstairs, though he didn't take a step in that direction.

"Rose, I'm sorry. I'm willing to learn if you'll teach me, but I don't know how to gain your trust."

Without another word, Edward walked up the stairs and out of sight, leaving the two girls to stare after him. Edward had looked so sad, not angry as she'd have expected of someone who was trying to manipulate everyone in sight. She still wasn't sure she could trust him, but Winry's words were worth considering. There indeed was no insincerity in his face.

"What was that all about?" asked Winry.

Rose sighed and hung her head. "I think I just screwed up royally."

_**Okay, this is the point where I wish you well, hoping that you enjoyed the story, and invite you to leave a review if you have any thoughts on it, hehe. As you may or may not remember, this will become a real book soon enough, so if you have any thoughts, do share them, but if not, don't worry about it, hehe. Hope you at least enjoyed the chapter, and see you again soon!**_


	6. Chapter 6

_**What do you know, I actually get the next chapter finished a short time after the last one, hehe. I've actually been stuck on this one for quite awhile, though none of you have noticed because I was way ahead of you for quite some time as well. Thank goodness I was, or you'd have all been waiting for me to get over this frump. Well, now you're caught up with me for the moment, but have no fear! I have the entire story outlined, so chances are good that I'll be racing ahead of you all once again!**_

_**Disclaimer: You guys all know that I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist, so why say it? How about I tell you something you don't know?...Like...my kitty is sitting in my lap and begging for attention. Believe me, that's unusual for this cat, hehe.**_

Edward had known before he came to Earth that many of the people here would be afraid of him, possibly even hate him, but it hadn't set well in his heart that it was really going to happen. He knew what kind of person he was, and it seemed strange for anyone to fear him, yet here he was in this situation where there was someone afraid of him, and she was living in the same house.

He suspected Al and Winry had feared him when they'd seen what he really was, since they had acted odd at first, but they had calmed down soon enough so he no longer worried, and he had never had the desire to probe their minds. Rose was a different story. She not only feared him, she hated him, and he wasn't sure why. He had probed deep enough into her mind to uncover some interesting things about her, but he hadn't had enough time to gain a thorough understanding of what the matter was with her. He didn't like being hated. He wanted her trust, but he wasn't sure how to get it. They hadn't covered this in his training.

The bed caught him as he threw himself onto it and he bounced a couple times before his weight settled. At least they didn't expect him to share a room with the girl who hated him. Ed glanced around the room where he now found himself. It was messy since they hadn't yet rearranged the furniture, but they had managed to get Edward's bed in there on the opposite side of the room from Al's bed. If the events of the day were anything to go by, then Winry would probably be a more understanding roommate than Al, but they hadn't offered that option. Maybe humans had issues with people of the opposite sex sleeping in the same room, as silly as that sounded.

He looked up at the ceiling. This world was so strange. Even the way they built their houses was vastly different than anything he had experienced before. Everything was closed and guarded under lock and key. The primitive culture of Earth fascinated him, even if it was inconvenient, but it bothered him how many of the things they built centered around fear.

On his planet, they didn't lock their doors...they didn't have doors at all. All they needed was a simple force field to keep the chosen temperature inside and keep the elements and stray animals outside. There was no need to protect themselves from others of their kind, and it saddened him to think that any race would have to. Most races went through a fear stage as they discovered who they were as a people, but his race didn't remember all their own history. They had probably been just like this a long time ago.

Edward sat up and rubbed his eyes. There was no point in moping all day. Somehow he would befriend Rose. He wasn't entirely sure it was possible, but he was going to try. Something had to work. He had seen enough in her mind to have a clue about her likes and dislikes and some of the things she had gone through, and he had to admit her life had not been easy. Maybe she just needed someone to talk to, though that would require gaining her trust first. It was an endless cycle of no progress.

He stood up and brushed himself off. There wasn't any dust on his clothes yet, but his planet had been so dusty that it had become a habit to brush himself off at every opportunity. At least that was one thing Earth had that was better than his home planet: it had a lot more greenery, which kept the dust down. He could learn to love that. These Earth people didn't know how good they had it.

Now seemed to be a good a time to experiment with his art and see which styles humans responded to favorably. He wanted to solve the situation with Rose as soon as possible, but he didn't have any solutions at the moment; he needed to distract himself with something else.

Al hadn't given him any art supplies yet, though that was to be expected, as they hadn't expected Edward to work so soon upon his arrival, but he was sure he could find something to work with on his own. There was so much junk in Al's room that he was sure Al never used he was bound to find something to work with. He dug through several piles of clothes, trinkets, and things he couldn't categorize. He pulled out a square piece of wood from one of the piles.

Humans seemed to like flat art from the little he'd observed, so he'd try to appeal to their tastes as much as he could. There didn't seem to be anything special about this particular piece of wood, so he didn't think Al would mind if he used it for this purpose. He sat down on the bed and placed the board across his lap, then closed his eyes and began to concentrate.

Choosing a good design wasn't as easy as he had thought since he knew the tastes of his own people, but not of humans. He'd always had a preference for creating replicas of mysterious, powerful creatures, but he wasn't sure humans would understand if he did that. If he could think of something that humans could relate to, the task would be a lot easier.

His mind wandered, and he found himself back on the train to Reisenburgh. That had been a very strange experience. It was like running fast, but traveling slow. Was that seriously their fastest method of transportation? It seemed ill-suited to the task of taking people around the world, but who was he to judge? If they wanted to travel slowly, then they were free to travel slowly.

There had been a lady sitting in a seat near his who had a pouch draped over her shoulder. A number of the women he had seen on Earth had them, but men rarely ever did. That was curious, but he he didn't understand Earth people. The lady's pouch had a sparkly design that seemed to represent some sort of green animal, if he was understanding the artist's intention correctly. It looked interesting to him, in any case.

He brought his focus back to the board on his lap and visualized a more realistic version of what he imagined that animal to look like. Energy sprung from within him and rippled down his arms, burning his fingertips. This was the sign he was ready.

He cautiously opened his eyes and guided his fingertips over the surface of the wood, leaving brown marks wherever he touched. It generally took most of a person's lifetime to master this skill, but Edward had mastered it while he was still a child. It took a lot of energy from him, as any art form that relied on the creator's own power did, but he was usually able to channel the energy flow long enough to create one artwork, or at least half of one. Fumes rose off the wood as he continued to mark it with his burning fingertips.

This was good quality wood, so the creation process was much more enjoyable. Again, Earth people had no idea how good they had it. Their plant life was much better than his planet's. It was more evolved perhaps, or better adapted. He wasn't quite sure what was different about it or why, but it certainly did the job better than anything he had back home.

After a while, he stopped and rubbed at his forehead. He wasn't sure if he was done, but he couldn't continue at the moment since he had used up most of his energy. He would look at it in a moment and see if he had created what he had visualized, but the most important thing was to ensure he concentrated on regaining the energy he had spent.

At that moment, Al entered the room. Upon seeing Edward with the board across his lap, he chuckled and a concerned expression crossed his face. "Edward, are you okay?"

"Yeah." Edward pulled his hand away from his forehead and looked at Al. "Why?"

Al pointed at Edward."Your glow is dimmer than normal."

Edward snorted and rolled his eyes. Al needed to learn a few things about his people. Their glow went up and down all the time, and it was perfectly normal. One only had to worry if it got too bright or too dim, but Al would learn soon enough.

"I spent a lot of energy making this," He lifted the piece of wood for Al to see.

Al was speechless, and he came close so he could see better. Had Al never seen burnt wood as an art form? It seemed a rather primitive form of art, though it was one Edward loved, so he thought humans would be able to handle it.

"Wow..." Al said, as he touched the image on the wood, "That's...wow, that's really well done. How did you do that?"

Edward shrugged and propped up his chin with his free hand. "I just channel my energy into the wood, but it takes a lot of energy."

"I'd imagine," said Al, as he ran his fingers over the wood. "How did you get that glowing effect? I've seen wood burnings, but never ones that had a faint glow like this."

Edward shrugged as he shook his head. He didn't have an answer to that. His people transferred some of their glowing ability to their creations sometimes, yet they had no idea how they did it. As far as their technology had come, there were still a few unanswered questions.

Al stood up and took a step backward to get a better look at the picture. He chuckled. "You used an old piece of a desk I had meant to repair but never did. Nice." Edward was nervous that Al might scold him for not asking permission, but he caught Al's reassuring smile and decided Al didn't mind.

"So you know about dragons?"

Edward blinked and sat up straight. "I know about what?"

"Dragons." Al motioned toward the wood burning. "That animal is called a dragon."

Understanding dawned on Edward's face, and he placed the artwork back on his lap so he could look at it with a critical eye. A smile spread across his face, and as he spoke, the pitch of his voice raised in a silly sing-songy tone. "Well, aren't you the cutest little dragon? I bet you're hungry, aren't you? What's that, you want to bite my head off? No, I don't think so. Why not? Because I'm still using it. Oh alright, you can have my head when I'm done with it."

Al covered his mouth with his hand as to suppress his giggles, but it didn't help much. Edward looked up from his one-sided conversation and raised an eyebrow at Al, but said nothing, knowing exactly what Al was reacting to. He shook his head and chuckled. It was so much fun to act stupid and get laughed at for it.

Edward was tired and needed to rest or he would have difficulty regaining his spent energy, so he handed the piece of wood to Al and flopped onto his bed. Al gave an understanding nod and left the room.

This was the first time Edward had ever slept on a human bed. What would it be like to sleep on something so squishy-bouncy? It felt good now that he had decided it had no intentions of eating him, but he couldn't imagine how one could fall asleep on something that moved every time you did. Maybe it was a good thing he was napping so he could discover how to sleep like a human before he shared the space with Al that night.

Edward drifted off to sleep, but he woke up sooner than he intended, tired and groggy. He sat up and rubbed his neck, which was sore from sleeping in an awkward position. Didn't humans realize that sleeping with so much support only caused your muscles to grow soft? Maybe he should get rid of the bed they had given him and make himself a space on the floor. They'd had to steal one of the mattresses from Rose's bed for him, so she might appreciate it being returned. It would make her bed softer anyway.

Edward stood up and stretched his arms over his head, hoping that would help his cramped muscles to stop agonizing over the way he slept on them, but it didn't. This exchange student business was really stressful. It wasn't nearly as simple as he had thought it would be. No wonder the leaders of his home world had been so fussy about his training.

He sat on the bed, unsure what to do next. Al and Winry had accepted him and were allowing him to stay, but Rose was anything but accepting, and that made him feel uncomfortable. He wanted to be on good terms with everyone, and while someone in the household hated him, he felt awkward walking freely around the house.

His stomach rumbled and he rolled his eyes. Traitor. It had to speak up when he wanted to stay put, didn't it? Well, if he had to leave the room to satisfy his stomach, then he might as well pay a visit to an old, er, new friend. He could really use some chocolate, and he was sure that Winry had some more of those chocolate chips hidden in the kitchen.

Edward got up and tiptoed down the stairs, into the kitchen. He couldn't remember exactly where Winry had stored the chocolate chips, but he knew she had pulled everything out of cupboards, so he began opening and closing random cupboard doors as silently as possible so as to not attract attention.

Finally, he spotted a bag that looked suspiciously like the bag of chocolate chips Winry had pulled out before, and he seized it eagerly. The wording on the package said that these were chocolate chips, and even better, this package appeared to have been unopened, which meant more chocolate for him.

Now to find a place to hide while he ate his chocolate in peace. He tiptoed out of the kitchen and cautiously looked around. He knew Rose was upstairs in her bedroom, since he had heard her talking to someone on his way past her door who he guessed to be Winry. Since Al had taken his artwork earlier, he assumed Al had probably left the house. Knowing where all three people were gave him a greater chance of avoiding getting caught.

Edward spied a door on the side of the foyer he hadn't noticed before. Curious, he turned the knob and opened it. Several thick coats hung inside in much the same way Rose's clothes hung in her closet. This was probably another closet of some sort, but it wasn't in anyone's bedroom. That seemed strange. All the same, no one was around, and they probably wouldn't think to look for him here. This was perfect.

He climbed inside the closet and shut the door behind him. It would have seemed dark inside if it hadn't been for his glowing skin illuminating the darkness. Thankfully, it wasn't dark outside of the closet, so anyone walking by wouldn't notice the light creeping out underneath the door. He only needed a few minutes to gobble the whole bag of chocolate chips, and none would be the wiser.

Edward tore open the bag of chocolate chips, and the scent of chocolate wafted its way into his nose. He exhaled a sigh of happiness as his eyes rolled back into his head. He reached a hand into the bag and pulled out a handful of chocolate chips. As soon as his hand touched the morsels, his mouth watered in anticipation of what was to come. He clenched the morsels in his fist and raised them to his mouth, nibbling at them eagerly. This was pure heaven.

He followed with a second handful, and a third, each one more blissful than the one before. When he went home, he would have to teach his people about the wonders of chocolate. There was no way he was going to live on without the stuff.

It wasn't long before he had finished off the entire bag and was shaking the empty bag in the hope that a couple more chips would fall out. But alas, he had eaten the entire bagful, and there were no more chocolate chips to be had. He sighed and closed his eyes. At least he could savor the taste in his mouth.

A few minutes later, Edward squirmed uncomfortably. His stomach was screaming bloody murder, but he didn't understand why. He was exhausted and feeling nauseous, and his aura had reduced in intensity to reflect his current state of health.

"Oooooooh…" he moaned, rubbing at his stomach. Apparently, he had moaned that aloud, because footsteps clacked just outside the closet door, and the knob turned and the door opened to reveal Al standing there, one eyebrow raised and a puzzled expression on his face.

"What's going on here?"

Edward moaned and rolled onto his side. He was going to throw up any moment if he wasn't careful. "I think I ate some tainted chocolate chips."

Al's head inclined forward and his expression became serious. "How many chocolate chips did you eat?"

Edward grabbed the empty bag and held it up for Al to see, hoping Al wouldn't be as vindictive as Winry would be if she discovered he had stolen a bag of chocolate chips. "Just this much."

Al grabbed the empty bag and stared at it, then back at Edward. A look of disbelief had crossed his face, but Edward couldn't fathom why. Finally Al shook his head and said, "You didn't eat this much chocolate."

Edward moaned again. "Uh-huh…"

Al rolled his eyes and shook his head. "No wonder you're sick! Ever heard of a thing called temperance?"

"They never sold temperance on my planet."

Al started to chuckle at that but clamped his mouth shut. Edward didn't know what was so funny, but he guessed he'd said something stupid again. When would that annoying habit stop? For that matter, when would the pain in his stomach stop?

"Um," Al was looking for words to say, "You ate too much chocolate, I'm afraid. Too much of a good thing will make you sick."

Edward's moan turned into a whine. How could there be such a concept as too much of a good thing? If it was good, wasn't it supposed to be always be good? Was it an Earth thing to have things that were both good and bad at the same time? That had been such a cruel trick in getting him to fall in love with chocolate without informing him of the consequences.

He sat up slowly and felt the sickness rush through him as his stomach lurched from its current burden. "Oh, chocolate, why are you such a fickle friend?"

Al chuckled again, but Edward didn't care. The next thing he knew, Al had bent down and taken one of Edward's arms and placed it around his shoulders. Al then used his free hand to grab Edward around the waist and hoist him up to a standing position, much to Edward's dismay as this action caused his stomach to lurch again.

"I'll help you up to our room," said Al, "You'll have to rest until this goes away."

"So it will go away?"

"Of course," said Al, "This sort of thing always goes away sooner or later. You have to be careful about how much chocolate you eat next time so this doesn't happen."

"I don't think I'm going to eat another chocolate chip as long as I live." Edward shook his head.

Al smiled knowingly as he helped the boy up the stairs. "We'll see."

Al helped Edward onto his bed and pulled the covers over him before calmly escorting himself out of the room. Edward was too sick to tell Al about wanting to give the mattress back to Rose, so he decided he'd put up with it for one more session. Hopefully the springiness in the mattress wouldn't aggravate his already sick stomach.

Slowly, the pain decreased, and his eyelids fluttered shut. His body thought it was capable of falling asleep in this situation, but he knew better, as his mind was wide awake. The thought of that made him nervous, so he tried to move his fingers and found that they barely responded to the signals his brain sent to them.

Edward groaned. He was slipping into a sleep paralysis state. It was a condition that ran in his family, so it didn't alarm him, but it was quite annoying. His body had the tendency to fall asleep and not respond to commands to move even though his mind was wide awake. He would have to either wait until his body woke up on its own or until someone figured out what was happening and shook him awake. This was not a fun situation to be in. The overdose of chocolate must have triggered his weakness.

He sighed, feeling like a prisoner in his own body, and his eyelids began to flutter, signaling the arrival of dreams soon. Considering how his body felt, the dreams would probably not be pleasant. He wanted to wake up badly, but his body was no longer responding to him, not even slightly.

And then the dreams started. He found himself back in Rose's room, holding the picture of her boyfriend. He closed his eyes and tried to connect with the man, but this time, instead of failing to connect, he succeeded…and he wished he hadn't. The man was alive, but he didn't like what he saw around the man.

Kain was standing in some sort of cage, attempting to reach his hand through the bars, only to get zapped by a purple electrical flash. Undeterred, he'd try again, and yet again, failing each time. Finally an angry shout came from somewhere off to the side of Edward's view, and a javelin was thrust into the cage, making Kain have to dodge out of the way to avoid getting stabbed.

Edward shuttered involuntarily, but couldn't remember why. The scene before him was disturbing, but there was something very wrong with it that he couldn't place. He recognized something amiss with the picture that lay before him, but it wasn't connecting with his consciousness at the moment.

The dream shifted and he was back on his world. He cried as he explained to the leaders why he had failed in his mission and was met with angry stares and crossed arms. He had failed his people, and he knew they were all going to die at any moment, but he wanted to die knowing his people still loved him. Maybe he didn't deserve their love or respect, since he hadn't done what he had set out to do.

A little girl ran up and grabbed at Edward's arm. He turned his attention away from the men who refused to budge and looked at where she was pointing, the sun. Indeed, it had grown visibly unstable in the sky. So this was it. Any moment now, all of them would be dead. He closed his eyes and waited for the inevitable to come upon them as he heard a loud boom.

The next thing he knew, he was shaken awake by strong hands, and he opened his eyes to see Al staring back at him, a concerned expression on his face. How had he known he couldn't wake up in this state? He was grateful to Al for doing that, however it was he had known.

Edward's lips twitched as he tried to utter a word of thanks, but Al simply smiled and nodded as though he understood exactly what Edward was trying to say.

"You were having some sort of nightmare," said Al, "We could hear your screams throughout the house." Edward felt embarrassed at hearing that, as he didn't like to appear powerless against anything, but he knew Al had meant no harm in his implication.

"When I came to wake you up, I was surprised to see you weren't moving at all except for your screams," Al continued, "Do you have problems with sleep paralysis?"

Edward's eyes went wide at hearing Al say those words. Did humans have that problem too? Maybe the two species were more alike than he had thought. He sighed. "Y-yeah…sort of…"

Al nodded sympathetically. "I understand. I'll keep that in mind should I ever find you unable to move again."

"Th-Thanks…" Edward said, still unsure whether he was pleased about the situation, but at least Al wasn't looking down on him for having a weakness. He picked Al's hands off of his shoulders and pushed himself up to a sitting position. The sickness had gone down by then, so he no longer felt woozy, but that was the last time he overindulged in chocolate.

"Hey!" said a female voice belonging to the notorious wrench queen, "Has anyone seen what happened to that other bag of chocolate chips? I was going to make a cake later."

Edward covered his mouth as his stomach lurched once again and he fell back onto the bed as his strength gave way. Winry raised an eyebrow at Edward's behavior and she turned to Al. "What's the matter with him?"

Al smirked as he looked at Edward and then back at Winry. "Let's just say he's had enough chocolate for one day."

Edward moaned as the two walked out of the room, Al trying to explain what happened as delicately as possible so as to not upset Winry. "Chocolate," said Edward once again, "You are a fickle friend indeed."

_**As before, if you have any thoughts on this, by all means, review. If not, no pressure, just enjoy it. It's great getting feedback from my readers so that I know what the readers want since this will be published after I've finished writing it and change it so it's not a fanfic anymore. ((Yes, I keep saying that over and over again, but some people seem to have short term memories, hehe.)) Even if you don't have thoughts on this story, you're welcome to suggest other stories you'd like to see me do. Once I'm done with this one, I'll naturally be moving on to something else ((Probably "The Call of Atlantis")), and will need ideas for what that "something else" should be.**_

_**Anyway, thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it, and hope to see you all around again soon!**_


	7. Chapter 7

_**Hmmm...this is my shortest chapter thus far in this story. Oh well, hopefully you all still find it interesting anyway, hehe. Sorry for taking so long on it. I had it written for some time, but kept putting off the editing because there was a large chunk where I had forgotten to "show, don't tell!" and I thought it would be hard to fix it. Turns out I was wrong, hehe. That was very easy to fix. So, here it is. Feel free to give me your opinions on it and tell me if I "showed" well enough.**_

_**Also, how many of you have heard of NaNoWriMo ((National Novel Writing Month))? It occurs every November where the challenge is to write an entire 50,000 word novel in one month. Well, it's not November, but it just so happens that I found a spinoff site, NaNoCoMo ((National Novel Continuation Month)) that was created to give you more NaNoWriMo when NaNoWriMo wasn't around, hehe, so they basically host the competition every month. It's good for encouragement if you can find a bunch of people to cheer you on, since 50k in a month is quite a challenge, though I did it last year, so I'm sure I can do it again, and I'm going to do it again this year, but FIRST I'm going to finish this story, in September with NaNoCoMo. The reason I'm telling all of you? First, because if I tell a whole bunch of people that I will have this novel's first draft finished by September 30th and then I don't, I'll feel really stupid, and second, because it might delay updates for a while ((though the updates will be quite fast after September, hehe.)) Here's my personal guarantee: If I don't have the rough draft finished by September 30th and don't upload the next chapter by October 3rd saying so, you may personally plot my demise. ((snickers)) Okay, don't literally kill me, but if I don't keep my word, go ahead and make me feel stupid. That'll ensure that I never get lazy about doing what I said I would again.**_

_**In any case, hope you enjoy the chapter!**_

_**Disclaimer: Aw, come on, it's nearly five in the morning! I stayed up late to get this chapter to you! You mean I have to do a disclaimer too? ((mumbles))Idon'townFullmetalAlchemist,youhappy?**_

The door opened and Edward looked up to see who had intruded on his space. It was Al. He should have guessed.

Al pulled a shirt out of the closet. He put it on as he turned toward Edward. "Are you feeling better?"

Edward rolled his eyes. "Yeeeeesss…and I might eat chocolate again some day, but warn me when I'm about to approach its evil side."

Al seemed amused, which didn't surprise Edward. Al was amused at everything. "So does that mean you're feeling good enough to have dinner?"

Dinner…he couldn't recall that word. He hated to admit that he didn't know yet another word, but he wasn't sure how he could pretend to understand. His people learned alien tongues from language samples collected over time, and that meant some common words were left out.

Edward felt his embarrassment increase as he remained silent, hoping to come up with a solution to the problem. Al noticed his reaction. "Is something the matter?"

"Uh…no?"

Al's expression changed to show he didn't believe that. "Seriously, what's the matter?"

Edward's blush increased, and his aura shone brighter. "It's nothing important." Al shook his head. He didn't believe that either. Edward sighed and looked up at Al. "I sometimes don't understand the words you use."

Al chuckled. "So does that mean you don't understand what dinner is?"

Edward shook his head, feeling more embarrassed. Al buttoned his shirt and turned his full attention to Edward. "It's the name of one of our meals. We call them by different names."

"I knew that," said Edward, "but I thought supper happened about now, not dinner." He looked out the window to confirm his suspicions. The sun was indeed going down.

"Supper is another name. Actually, that's the name most of the country people use, but for some reason, our family doesn't. Our parents must have been city folks."

Edward nodded slowly and pretended to understand. It didn't make sense to use different words for the same thing, but he'd go along. Earth people were strange, so he might as well accept that.

"O-kay…then I guess I'll come down for…dinner?"

Al chuckled again, nodded, extended his hand so Edward could take it, and led Edward to the dining room.

Rose was already at the table, and she looked the other way as soon as Edward entered the room. Edward grimaced and looked at the ground. He wanted to befriend her, but he didn't know how. Al patted him on the shoulder. At least someone understood what he was going through.

Al seated him at the table and went into the kitchen to help Winry. He wondered what Earth meals were like. He would have enjoyed this first meal more if he hadn't had to deal with Rose's cold glare.

He sighed and sat back in his seat as he waited for Al and Winry. He wished they hadn't left him alone with Rose, but he knew he was going to have to deal with her at some point.

His toes drew circles on the floor, and he caught a glare from Rose. He stopped moving and tried to hold himself still, but he couldn't do so for long. His anxiety level was too high, so he started drumming his fingers against his knees. At least that didn't make any sound, but doing so caused a rhythm to take over his whole body and his foot tapped along in sync with his fingers. This caused another stare from Rose, and Edward immediately stopped everything he was doing, but it wasn't long before he started again. It was so hard not to fidget when he was nervous.

Al and Winry brought out several dishes of food and Edward breathed a sigh of relief. At least he wouldn't have to behave himself around a cold Rose alone anymore.

Al and Winry placed the dishes on the table and sat in their places. Earlier that day, Edward would have reached for the food without thinking first, but he didn't dare do so now. He had learned quickly that his ways were different from the ways of Earth, and he didn't want to make more of a fool of himself than he already had.

Winry smiled and passed a dish to him, but he didn't know what to do, so he waited. She caught on and got out of her seat and went over to him.

She reached a large spoon into some white glop in the bowl and placed that spoonful of white glop on his plate. She passed the rest of the glop to Al.

"What is this stuff?" said Edward, poking nervously at the glop with his finger.

"Mashed potatoes," said Winry. "You eat that with your silverware." She gestured toward the fork, spoon, and knife that were on the table. "I would recommend a spoon for eating mashed potatoes. It's a little easier." She picked up the spoon and showed him, then returned it to where it had been.

Winry grabbed another dish and brought it over to where Edward was. "This is steak." She grabbed something that looked like a large fork with only two prongs and poked it into one of the things on the dish, then dropped the thing onto his plate.

"Use your fork and knife for this one. Stab the fork into it like this," she demonstrated the process for him, "and cut off a bite-sized piece with your knife."

Edward nodded. It seemed an efficient method of keeping hands clean. He watched everyone eat for a few minutes before he picked up his own utensils.

It didn't take long to learn how to use them, but it was very strange. In spite of the advanced technology of his people compared with that of Earth, his people ate with their fingers. His planet was so dusty, nobody cared if they dirtied their fingers, since they could clean up afterward. Earth people seemed a bit snooty about cleanliness, but he didn't mind. He would willingly adapt to their ways of cleanliness if he could gain the lush vegetation of their planet.

For the first few minutes, Al and Winry tried to lighten the situation by joking with each other, but the tension between Rose and Edward was too great, and the meal was finished in silence.

As soon as he finished the last bite of his meal, Edward pushed his plate away, stood up, and turned to leave. "Thank you, that was very good." Before anyone could protest, he had left the room.

He was only halfway up the stairs when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned to see Al looking at him with concerned eyes.

"Something's bothering you. What's wrong?"

Edward shook his head and put on a fake smile as he tried to ascend the stairs again, but Al grabbed his hand. "You can't fool me; something is bothering you."

Edward sighed. "It's the first day I've been here. There are so many changes to make."

Al nodded and released Edward's hand. Edward didn't want to explain about his nightmare or about how much Rose's actions hurt, so he was glad Al had believed that excuse.

He climbed the rest of the way and went into his room, closing the door to be alone in his thoughts.

Edward heard footsteps outside the door and groaned. Al wouldn't leave him alone, would he? He wanted some time to mope about how hard this task was turning out to be, but Al was making that difficult.

The door opened, and Al entered the room. "Are you okay, Edward?" he asked.

Edward nodded, but Al wasn't believing him anymore. He would have to find ways to distract Al so he would stop asking questions.

He pointed to a white and black thing on the wall. "What's that?"

Al turned to where Edward was pointing and smiled. "That's a clock. It helps us track time.

"Why do you need a machine to track time? Doesn't your sun do that for you?"

Al shrugged and sat down on his bed, facing Edward. "The sun isn't as precise. Using a clock, we can keep track of time down to the minute, the second, and even during the night."

Edward raised an eyebrow. "Why do you need to keep that much track? One is generally only awake during the day, or at least, my people are. The sun does a good job of telling you what time it is during the daytime, and at nighttime you're supposed to be asleep."

Al shrugged. "I guess I had never thought about it. It's a habit we humans have. We've become addicted to the preciseness of the clock.

"That seems inconsiderate," said Edward, "The sun is working hard for you, and you're ignoring his efforts."

"His?" Al said, repeating Edward's choice of pronoun. "The sun doesn't feel anything. It couldn't care less if we ignored it."

"You have no idea what it's like to wake up every morning and hear your sun weeping because she is about to die and us with her."

"So you're telling me that you were able to tell what your sun was feeling?"

"I can tell what anything is feeling," said Edward.

"So does that mean you're…empathic?" said Al.

"Rose said it was called 'telepathic'."

"No, no…" Al smiled amusedly and shook his head. "Telepathy is when you can read others' thoughts. Empathy is reading others' feelings."

Edward made a noise of annoyance out of the corner of his mouth. This was very stupid. Why did humans have to come up with different words for the same thing? "They sound similar to me."

Al shook his head once again and his face grew more serious, though still playful. "No, they're completely different. On one hand, you're feeling what everybody else feels, and on the other hand, you're thinking what everybody else thinks."

Edward rolled his eyes. "They go hand in hand, you can't have one without the other."

Al was silent for several moments before his eyes opened wide. "Are you telling me you're both empathic and telepathic?"

Edward rubbed the back of his head. "If those are your words for it, then yes, but you should use one word. It doesn't make sense to describe it with two different words when they go hand in hand."

"So," said Al, breaking through Edward's thoughts once again, "Can you tell me what I'm thinking right now?"

Edward smiled. Now he was getting somewhere. He stood up to walk over to where Al was. Al looked startled and said, "What are you doing?"

Edward shrugged. "I have to touch you. It's more accurate."

"O…kay…" said Al, and he scooted over to make room on his bed for Edward.

Edward sat down, put his hands on Al's shoulders, and closed his eyes. A moment later, the familiar images and feelings began to flash through Edward's mind. Edward felt jittery, but he knew the feeling wasn't coming from inside him, so it had to have been from Al. That wasn't something Edward had expected, but he could understand it if someone had never had their mind probed before.

Edward concentrated on the center of his forehead until he felt his connection reach out and press into Al's mind. Edward felt a jolt at the sudden connection, almost as if he wasn't welcome there, though he knew Al had given him permission to do this. Curiosity overcame him, and he probed deeper to find the feelings that might have caused such a reaction. Al was nervous about Edward being in their home because he didn't know how to take care of him or if their plan would work fully. He was also nervous about Rose and her treatment of Edward. Edward could have guessed those thoughts without probing, so he dug deeper to find hidden thoughts that would cause Al to react the way he had. Al tensed under Edward's doing so, but Edward pressed forward anyway. Al had given him permission to do this, so he was going to see it through.

An image of a woman entered his mind, Al's mother. Probing deeper, he saw the woman on her deathbed. That explained why he hadn't been introduced to her. He discovered several other deaths that had been significant: Winry's parents dying, and her beloved grandmother, whose death had been fairly recent. That was why Al and Winry were living together nowadays. They hadn't had an easy life.

Edward heard his nickname echoed through Al's mind. It was always strange to hear the person he probed think so strongly about him, but it was especially odd to hear the name "EDWARD!" ricochet through someone's mind. He answered to that name, but this was the only place people called him that.

Edward followed the echoes, hoping Al would lead him to the source of the trouble. No one called out someone's name like that under ordinary circumstances. An image flashed into Edward's mind of Al picking something up and holding it to his ear and mouth, a communication device. Edward's name continued to echo in the background, when the word "SPY" joined it.

_Spy?_

Another image followed the first, this one of himself speaking to his leaders, and his leaders returning to Earth and shedding human blood. Another word joined the cacophony in the background. "BETRAYAL"

_Spy? Betrayal? Me?_

Edward abruptly broke the connection and leaned back to look at Al. Now he understood why humans had issues with their minds being probed, if they harbored deep fears like that. He never would have guessed such a thing from someone like Al, but there were many things about humans he didn't yet understand.

"Al, relax." Edward squeezed Al's shoulders and tried to offer a reassuring smile, though he wasn't sure if it helped. "I'm not here to spy on your race and help my people take over yours." Al tensed, so Edward knew his words sunk home. Al hadn't expected his telepathic reading to be so accurate.

"Are you afraid of Rose turning me in?" Edward hadn't bothered to probe deep enough to answer his own question because the feelings had gotten so intense, but it was a logical assumption after what he had just seen. He could see how this would have bad repercussions on Al and Winry for taking care of him.

Al didn't seem to want to answer, but his body betrayed him and he nodded slowly. "That would be a problem," said Edward, and he sighed as he lowered his eyes and released Al's shoulders, "But I don't think she plans to do that. There were no such intentions in her mind when I probed her."

"You probed Rose's mind?" Al raised his eyebrows while Edward hung his head and laughed.

"Yeah, I did. I didn't realize it was impolite in human society without permission. She was not amused."

"That explains her coldness," said Al with a shake of his head. "Most people have some secrets that they want to stay buried, and they don't like someone digging them up."

"I can see why." A few minutes prior, he wouldn't have understood at all, but after his experiment with Al, he was beginning to understand the human condition.

"Well," said Al, "You've probed my mind, and it didn't hurt me." Al stood up. "I'll talk with Rose. Maybe I can convince her there's nothing to be afraid of."

Al would be lying to Rose if he told her there was nothing to fear, knowing just how much Al was afraid of Edward but was too polite to say, but if that was what it would take for peace, so be it. He turned his gaze to the floor. "I wish I could let you probe my mind so you could see I was harmless."

Al smiled a sad smile. "I wish we could too. It would help a lot." Edward nodded in silence, and Al left the room, shutting the door behind him. This trip was not turning out to be what he had thought it would be. He needed to find some place where he could go and think.

_**There you go, hope you liked that, but feel free to tell me your thoughts if you have any, and please wish me luck for both NaNoCoMo and NaNoWriMo, because I'll surely need it, hehe. See you all soon!**_


	8. Chapter 8

_**Okay, well, I did get this chapter up by the time I said I would, but I'm afraid I didn't finish my story by the time I said I would. ((Hides from angry fans)) Before you kill me, let me say this in my defense: I ended up making the story about twice as long as I'd originally anticipated, so I did meet my 50k writing goal for September, but I went beyond that into 100k and couldn't completely finish the story by September 30th because it had just gotten too long. If it's any comfort to know though, I only have on more chapter to write, hehe. Figured I'd get this up first though to let you all know my progress.**_

_**Anyway, Arktos told me to cut my author's notes shorter ((snickers)) so I'll try not to ramble this time. So, here's your disclaimer:**_

_**Disclaimer: The Jolly Rancher of wisdom taped to the center of my forehead says that I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist, and it's always right! Fear the mystical Jolly Rancher of wisdom!**_

Edward seemed sweet and harmless. Al knew that, but he also knew aliens were scary. Rose agreed or she wouldn't have shunned Edward as she had.

Edward was their guest, and Winry didn't take to anybody. She wasn't naive, so he tried to support her belief that Edward was harmless and needed their help, but it was hard to listen to what she said instead of his emotions. It was tempting to act like Rose and shun him, but he wasn't that sort of person.

When he came back downstairs, he found Rose still at the table. Her head was in her hands, and she looked as though she'd been crying. Winry stood nearby with her hand on Rose's shoulder. The girl was taking this as hard as Edward was.

Al stood in place without saying anything. He didn't want to say anything before he knew what the situation was. After a moment, he decided it would be fine to speak. "Is everything okay?"

Winry looked up to face Al and tapped Rose on the shoulder. "Rose here is troubled about Edward."

Al nodded. "I can see why." He turned to face Rose. "He tells me he probed your mind."

Rose shuddered and hid her face. Al wasn't sure if that was a reaction of fear or anger. Perhaps it was both. Winry raised an eyebrow and looked at Al. "Probed her mind?"

Al raised the corner of his mouth in a light smirk. "I suppose he hasn't told you he's telepathic."

"Telepath-wait, you're kidding!" said Winry. Al and rose shook their heads. Winry looked between Al and Rose in shock, her jaw dropped open, and her larynx refused to cooperate. "Telepathic…" she breathed, "why didn't he ever tell me?"

"Perhaps it didn't cross his mind," said Al. "All his people are. You wouldn't go announcing you're not telepathic, and he doesn't think to announce he is."

Winry placed a hand on her face. "I guess that makes sense…sort of…"

Rose cried and interrupted them. "Can we please stop talking about him?" The conversation ceased and their eyes became sad. There was nothing Al wanted more than peace and harmony, but he wasn't sure how to get it. He hadn't planned on this mixup when he signed up to host an exchange student, and he didn't know what to do. He couldn't call the agency and have them fix the problem.

They could get Rose transferred elsewhere, though that wasn't fair to her, but she might feel better if she were somewhere else. He would have to make an excuse why he was transferring the exchange student he had sent for, but that was the least of his worries. He had to wait until she calmed down and ask her what she what she wanted.

Al cleared his throat. He had to say something, even though it was difficult to find the right words. He couldn't let the conversation go on like this. Rose looked up to hear what he was saying. "If it helps any, Edward probed my mind too."

"He did?!" Rose pulled her hands away from her face and gave him her full attention. "Doesn't he realize how inconsiderate that is?"

Al winced at the anger in her voice, but was saddened at the tears running down her face. "I gave him permission, Rose. He learned his lesson after the incident with you."

"What incident?" Winry looked between Al and Rose. "What are you two talking about?"

Al waved her off. "I'll explain later, Winry."

"No! I want to know now!"

"Winry, please, don't do this right now." Al's patience was draining. The situation was going from bad to worse, and he could not handle a disagreement with his best friend.

Tears shown on her face, "Al, what are you hiding from me?"

"Nothing, Winry!" Anger welled inside him. "I don't want to talk about it now."

Winry threw her arms in the air. "Fine!" She stormed out of the room and Al sighed and shook his head. He blinked hard to hold back tears. It wasn't manly to cry. They would be on good terms soon. They always managed to make up, but it still hurt.

Al pulled out a chair and sat at the table. "It's just you and me, Rose. Is there anything you want to talk about?"

Rose shook her head. "No, I just want to wake up and find out this was all a bad dream."

Al took her hand in his. "Edward isn't bad, Rose, he's just…different. He's new, so we're all scared."

"How can you be sure he doesn't mean us harm? How can you be sure of anything?"

Al shrugged. "I can't say. Something tells me he's innocent. When I look into his eyes, he seems like a child. He doesn't have the eyes of a conqueror, Rose, he has the eyes of someone who is lost."

Rose turned away. "I just…I can't trust him!"

Al sighed and lowered his gaze. He understood her feelings. It was hard to trust somebody you didn't understand. "Well, we'll have to figure something out, so we might as well stay here and talk until we do."

Rose didn't turn to face him, but her shoulders slumped, so Al knew she had gotten the message. Now they could talk. They would probably be here for a while.

Winry's hands balled into fists and she stomped through the hallway. How dare Al treat her like that! This was her house. She had invited him to stay with her. What made him think he could not tell her things she needed to know? It wasn't fair.

She started to walk to her bedroom when a thought struck her. She could ask Edward. He might be more willing to speak up than Al or Rose. Edward had treated her nicely thus far. She pushed Edward's door open and stepped inside, only to feel the cold night air blow in through the window. She walked over to the window and shut it before turning around to locate Edward.

He wasn't in the room. Maybe he went to the bathroom. She wasn't sure if Al had explained the bathroom facilities to him, but he could have guessed on his own.

She went to check the bathroom. Nobody was in there. Strange. Where else could he have gone? Maybe he had gotten lonely and went to look for her. He could be in her room, or in Rose's. He and Rose were having issues, so she wasn't sure why he would go to her room, but it was possible. Maybe he didn't know it was impolite to snoop.

She bounded to her room. No Edward. She ran to Rose's room and looked, but there was no Edward there either. Where could that boy have gone? Was he doing something strange like hiding in a closet? He was an alien, so maybe he did strange things like that.

She retraced her steps and checked every closet on the top floor, but there was still no trace of him. Where could Edward be? Could he have gone down to the main floor? Wouldn't they have seen him go past?

She hurried downstairs and looked in all the rooms and the closets. Finding no one, she threw her hands up and shouted to no one. "Alright, where is Edward? I can't find him anywhere!"

Al raised an eyebrow, and Rose tensed. "Edward is missing?"

Rose pulled her arms toward herself and mumbled, "I wish he would run away."

Al snapped his head toward her. "No! We can't have him do that! That would fall back on us."

Rose sighed. "I suppose…"

Winry crossed her arms and stamped her foot. She was peeved, and those two weren't helping. Didn't they care enough about Edward to stop bickering for a few moments? It seemed she would have to search for Edward by herself.

"Alright, you two, will you stop bickering and help me search, or must I do this alone?"

Al turned to face her and asked, "Did you check our room?"

"Yep."

"What about your room?"

"Checked it."

"Rose's room?"

"Checked it."

"Hmmm…what about the closets? I caught him in one today."

"I even checked the closets." Winry's foot tapped more impatiently than before. They weren't making any progress.

Al placed his hand on his chin. "Hmmm…did he leave any clues in our room about where he had gone?"

Winry rolled her eyes. "Don't you think I would have noticed if he had?"

Al shrugged. "Maybe, maybe not. Was there anything odd about the room when you went in there?"

"Only that the window was op-" Winry stopped mid-sentence and smacked her forehead. "Of course, he snuck out the window!"

Al blinked and sat up straight. "What-why?"

Winry huffed. "How would I know?" She tromped over to the coat rack, grabbed her coat, and slung it on. "If any of you plan to help me, I'd suggest you come outside and look for him before somebody else finds him."

Al and Rose turned to look at each other, and Winry rolled her eyes as she stepped outside and slammed the door.

Winry was angry as she walked outside and stomped her feet in the mud. She wasn't sure if Al and Rose supported her, but she didn't care. She was angry, and she wanted to solve this. Edward should not have run off like he had. She thought they had established a trust between each other.

What had gotten into him? She knew he was upset over Rose and she understood that, but she didn't understand why he would leave without telling them. Didn't he understand leaving could put them all in danger? Never mind that. She wasn't as concerned for her safety as she was for his. He didn't know anything about this world.

"Edward, where are you?" She was met with silence, so she continued to tromp around regardless. She heard footsteps behind her and she spun around. Al and Rose walked a few meters behind her.

"So you showed up after all," she said.

Al sighed and nodded. "Yeah, we showed. Sorry it took us so long." Winry shrugged, turned around, and kept walking. She didn't really care what they were doing, she just wanted to find Edward. Her anxiety was growing, and she was upset. Where would he have gone? Where would she go if she were an alien?

She walked down the path along a country road, and she looked up along the hillside. There was a tiny pinprick of light where there shouldn't have been one. That could be Edward.

She sprinted toward the light, hoping she was correct, though she also hoped she was wrong, because that would mean Edward had been stupid and gone without his cloak. She hadn't thought to check whether he had taken his cloak with him.

She reached the spot where the light was, and she saw it wasn't Edward. He hadn't been that stupid. It was just a lantern set there without anybody around it. That was odd. Who would leave a lantern out in the middle of nowhere? She shrugged and was about to turn around when a voice spoke to her.

"So you found me."

She spun around and saw a cloaked silhouette sitting near the lantern. It was Edward's voice, so it was had to be him. At least he had been smart enough to cloak himself, but why the lantern?

Edward chuckled. There was that telepathy she had heard about. He must have read her thoughts. "I was homesick," he said, "and I had to get out and think, though I knew you would worry, so I brought this lantern-thing so you could find me. I know better than to have myself shine."

She nodded that she understood. At least he had thought about them, even though he had been stupid by coming out. She sat down beside him. "What got into you? You could get caught!"

Edward shrugged. "I know." He didn't say anything further as an explanation, so she sat closer and stared at what she imagined to be his face, but couldn't see anything.

"If you know, then why did you do it?"

"Like I said, I was just homesick." Winry shook her head.

She heard footsteps again behind her, and soon Al and Rose showed up. They all sighed in relief that he had been found, and and they ask him why he disappeared. He didn't seem coherent in his explanations, but it was clear he was upset.

"Why don't we go home now everybody's been found again?" said Al. Edward shook his head.

"Why not?" asked Winry.

"Because…I don't know…" he said, "I just don't feel…uh…I feel out of place."

Winry reached her hands around the boy and hugged him. "I know you do. We all feel out of place right now. We're making room in our house for people we don't know. That's a bit awkward."

"Yes, of course," said Edward, "but you aren't on an alien world either."

"No, that's true," said Winry.

Al looked up at the sky and whistled, causing everyone to turn to look at him, though it was difficult to see his face since it was nighttime. "So you're from somewhere out there," Al waved his hand at the sky. "Where out there are you from?"

Edward pointed to a bright star. He didn't say anything, but Al knew where he was pointing. "Sirius? No, you couldn't have been from that star. That star's too large to have a habitable planet orbiting it."

Edward shrugged and chuckled. "I never said that my planet was habitable, but that's not the star I was referring to. The star I'm from is just behind that one, hidden from view."

"You mean the Pup?"

"The Pup?" Edward said.

Al chuckled. "I mean the little star that orbits the big one. There are two 'Sirius' stars."

Edward shook his head. "Oh yeah, there are two in that system, but I meant one that is farther behind than that, something that isn't in that system. You can't see it from here with the unaided eye."

"O-kay…" said Al as he scratched his head and looked confused, "So your star just happens to be in the same line of sight, so it's hidden from view?"

"Yeah, more or less," said Edward.

Winry listened, but she couldn't understand all the scientific stuff they were talking about. She understood some of what they were discussing, but she didn't understand the names of stars and constellations and other things they were talking about, so she just listened. It was interesting, but she would have to ask Al to translate it into simple language later.

"There are some interesting legends about that particular star, you know," said Al.

"Oh really?" said Edward, "What kind of stories have you guys made for that star?"

"Well, Sirius is called 'the dog star'."

"Oh, that explains 'the Pup'."

"Yeah, they call it the Pup because it's the little dog star."

"Go on," said Edward.

"Anyway, the Dog Star has symbolized many things in the past. Some thought that the first time they saw it during the year heralded a famine in the land."

"A famine?" said Edward, "How can a star herald a famine?"

"I have no idea," said Al, "but that was one of the ideas people had."

Edward shook his head. "That's silly."

"Yes, I know," said Al, "but it worked for some people."

"I guess."

"Anyway," said Winry, as she held her arms around herself and shivered, "can we go home yet? I'm getting cold."

"I'm sorry, Winry," said Edward, "I suppose we could if we have to."

"Why don't you want to?"

Edward shrugged. He seemed hesitant to do anything or explain himself. He was friendly and sweet, but he didn't seem to feel together. It bothered her and she wanted him to feel safe and comfortable in their presence.

"Well, what do you want to do, Edward?"

Edward shrugged again and shook his head. "I don't really know."

Winry frowned and placed her hand on his shoulder. "You want to go back to your home world, don't you?"

Edward was startled by what she said, and he looked up into her face. "I don't really know," said Edward, "I'd just be going back to that dying world, and…I don't know…I-I want to live on a world that's as plentiful as this one, but I don't feel I belong. It's…It's hard to explain."

"I know." Winry nodded and put her arms around Edward. "I'm sure it is very hard. I can't even begin to understand what you're going through." Edward shuddered against her, and she wrapped her arms tighter around him. The poor boy, she had no idea what it was like. She had never even been an exchange student before, let alone an alien on another planet, and she doubted she'd ever have to experience that. She might go to another country someday, but she doubted she would ever visit another planet.

"Let's go home," he said. Winry's eyes opened wide for a moment as she realized he was the one that suggested it and not her. She nodded slowly and then released him as she grabbed his hand and beckoned him to follow her.

"Okay, we'll go home then."

When they got back to the house, they closed the door and sat down in the living room with a sigh. Edward pulled his cloak down so his face could shine now that it was safe to do so. Rose shuttered at the sight, though she must have expected it. Al stretched his neck, completely oblivious to everything, and Winry just looked around at everything, taking everything in at a glance.

Both exchange students had only been here for less than one day, and already things were so chaotic. It was only a few minutes before they were going to all go to bed, so the day was almost done, but she had no idea what the next day would be like, or the next. Would they all be equally chaotic, or would they calm down after this first day? She would have to wait and see.

Al sat up. "Okay, Edward, I guess it's time we got ready for bed."

Edward nodded. "I guess you're right." He stood and pulled his cloak off over his head. "You'll have to show me how to sleep on one of those bed-things."

"You don't sleep on one of those at your home?"

Edward shook his head. "We sleep on the ground, just as we sit on the ground."

Al rolled his eyes and whistled. "With all your advanced technology, you sure are primitive sometimes."

Edward chuckled. "We may be primitive, but at least we have strong backs and soft behinds." This earned a laugh from Al and Winry, and even the corner of Rose's mouth twitched a bit, though she seemed to be very resistant to warming up to Edward.

Al slapped Edward on the back. "Okay then, let's go upstairs. I'll show you how to get ready for bed." Edward nodded, and the two boys walked up the stairs. Rose looked at Winry for a long moment, then sighed, stood up, and went up the stairs after the boys had disappeared. Winry was left alone to think. She hoped things would be better the next day.

She sighed, pushed herself up, and ascended the stairs after everyone else. There was no telling what was going to happen next. She would have to wait and see.

_**Anyway, hope you liked that. Like I said, I have one more chapter to write, which I'll hopefully finish today. After that, I'll have to transcribe the past few chapters since I've been dictating them onto a voice recorder to write these chapters as fast as possible. Once that is done, I'll start editing chapter 9, and I'll start uploading these chapters as I edit them instead of waiting a week or two in between, so please stay tuned and be prepared for a barrage of chapters in the near future. There's over 30, hehe. **_

_**If you have any insights into anything you think could use improvement, by all means, comment and let me know. I've been working so feverishly at this story because it will indeed be a published book once I change the names and places and the time, and I want to make sure it's appealing to a book-reading audience. You don't have to review, but I'd love it if you would, since the more I get, the better I can make my book. ((smiles))**_

_**Oh yeah, and a couple questions that have been bugging me: I'm trying to find a compelling title for this story, so I'm changing the title of this periodically to experiment with the response I get. Do you like the current title, or do you have a suggestion for a new one?**_

_**Also, I go by some form of Reincarnated Alphonse everywhere but here, but I haven't changed my name here because I have a following. However, Arktos, author of the fanfic "Stranger than Fiction", started telling me I should change it anyway because she likes the name, hehe. I figured I'd ask my readers for their opinion. Change it or leave it alone? What do you think?**_

_**Anyway, that's all for now. See you all soon!**_


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